Tartarus
by Domini Porter
Summary: AU. In post-apocalyptic Boston, Dr. Maura Isles finds herself defending a group of women and children in the bombed-out remains of an urban hospital while Jane Rizzoli patrols the shattered city, searching for survivors, supplies, and something worth saving. Eventual Rizzles. A zombie story for people who don't even like zombies, that's the word on the street!
1. Prologue

**_Prologue_**

* * *

"It's okay," Maura whispered, reaching out to smooth the girl's bangs. "Don't be afraid, okay? You just have to—" she paused just long enough to let a short spray of bullets ricochet across the courtyard, "you just have to close your eyes, and think about your favorite place in the world. Can you do that for me?"

The girl nodded. Maura smiled, trying to make it reach her eyes, grasping protectively at the girl as a loud explosion sent bits of plaster showering down the walls. "Okay," Maura breathed. "Where is it? Where are you right now?"

"At the park," the girl said, her eyes squeezed tightly shut.

"Oh yeah?" Maura aimed the barrel of the rifle at a cluster of debris in the north end of the courtyard. _Movement. Something was moving._

"Yeah," the girl said, rhythmically clutching at the hem of Maura's jacket. "It's hot outside and I'm playing in the fountain."

"That sounds fun," Maura said, only half-listening._ Watch, Maura. If it moves, shoot it._

"My little brother is splashing me."

Maura saw something flicker out of the corner of her eye. Without thinking she swiveled and loosed three rounds in rapid succession. The little girl cried out and pressed her face against Maura's hip.

"I'm sorry, honey," she murmured, stroking the girl's hair again. "I'm sorry I scared you. Tell me about your little brother."

"I . . . don't want to," the girl whimpered. "He's . . . gone. And my parents are gone too, and my dog. They're all dead."

Maura didn't think it was possible for her to be affected by individual stories any more, after all she'd seen and heard, but she felt her heart break for the thousandth time as the little girl sniffled into her jacket.

"Oh sweetheart," she whispered, dropping the barrel of the gun to rest on the windowsill. She knelt down and took the girl's face in her hands, brushing away a tear with her thumb. "I'm sorry. You stay with me, all right? I'll protect you, I swear. I _swear_," she said again, looking gravely into the girl's face. She felt her blood run slightly cold as she said it but she cupped the girl's chin, looked into the girl's eyes with dead certainty. "You stay with me, okay?"

The girl took a deep breath and nodded. Maura saw her struggling to stop her tears, to hide the pain she was feeling. She was at most eight years old.

"I have to keep watching," Maura apologized softly.

"I know," the girl said, her voice still slightly watery. "You kill the bad ones."

Maura's breath caught in her throat. _I kill the bad ones_.

She had never imagined herself a killer. Not _before_. She had a physician's commitment to preserving and enriching human life, even though she had specialized in the dead. But these . . . these _things_ she was fighting, that she was killing, they weren't human. Not any more. Not by any measure she held dear.

She thought of Jane, somewhere on the outskirts of the city, searching for supplies, for survivors, for something worth holding on to. She remembered briefly the way Jane had held her close as she'd shown her how to shoot the heavy rifle.

_I kill the bad ones._

"Yes," she said grimly. "I do."

"I'm good at seeing things," the girl said after a beat, half-hesitant as though she didn't want to seem like she was bragging. Maura smiled wanly.

"Oh yeah?"

"Real good," the girl said, perking up slightly. "I'm the best seeker at hide-and-seek."

"Oh I don't know about that," Maura said, shifting her tone into one of deep seriousness.

"I am! The best!"

"Okay." Maura shifted position so that she was pressed against the right side of the window frame. "Look in that black bag over there, next to the cabinet."

"This one?" the girl darted across the room to the bag, struggling with the zipper.

"That one," Maura said. "In the outside pocket there's a pair of binoculars, can you find them?"

"Yeah," the girl said, her tone a mixture of excitement and studied focus. "These?" She held up a small pair of binoculars, looked at Maura anxiously.

"Those," Maura replied. "Now, what I want you to do is get that chair from over there and pull it up behind me, a little to the left. I want you to sit on it and look out the window and tell me if you see anything, but I need you to sit back so nothing out there sees _you_, all right?"

The girl nodded. She dragged the chair with a loud squeal over to where Maura was crouched with the rifle, climbing on to it, pulling her knees to her chest and balancing the binoculars on them. Maura smiled, though her brows knitted together with the wrenching tightness of all the agony she'd seen since the darkness had come, all of it reflected in the eyes of a little girl she had deputized to scout for her. A child she had given the task of alerting her as to when and where she should deliver death.

"What's your name?" the girl asked softly after a few minutes had passed. Then, "You're the doctor, right?"

"I'm the doctor, yes," Maura said, her eye still pressed to the rifle's scope. "But you can call me Maura."

"Okay Maura," the girl said. "My name is Carrie and I'm seven and three-quarters years old."

"It's very nice to meet you, Carrie," Maura said, focusing hard on the north end of the courtyard, the place with the weakest defenses.

"It's very nice to meet you too," Carrie replied with a politeness Maura found jarring when echoing off the crumbling, exposed cinderblocks of the badly-damaged hospital walls. "You're pretty."

Maura grinned genuinely for the first time in weeks. "Thank you," she said, "so are you. I like your red hair."

"My brother always said it looked stupid. But my dad called me Strawberry."

"That's a nice name."

"You should call me Carrie, though," Carrie said, sounding a little self-conscious. "Because we're at war and we have to win."

_We're at war and we have to win_.

The message had been broadcast over the short-wave radios, had been printed on hastily drawn up leaflets, had been spray-painted on every remaining piece of wall large enough to contain the words.

_We're at war and we have to win._

* * *

This is going to be a whole thing, you guys. I can tell already. Like if Cormac McCarthy and the Road Warrior had a baby that looked runway-ready in a keffiyeh and a Kalashnikov. Are you excited? I AM EXCITED! It's based on a manip I saw on Tumblr and have credited the hell out of over there, done by ranejizzoli (who is someone else here, but aren't we all). If you happen to see it, you should reblog or at the very least like it, because it is my faaaavorite and it's where this story came from!


	2. Before and After

It had begun with sirens.

"What is that?" Jane said, moving to the window. Frost stood up at his desk. Korsak, Jane saw, had already picked up his phone.

"Sounds like a storm signal," Frost said, frowning. "But I've never heard that one before."

Korsak hung up the phone.

"Rizzoli," he said, his voice more controlled than Jane had ever heard it. She immediately felt her blood run cold. "Frost. Get down to evidence, get all the weapons you can find."

"What the hell's going on, Korsak?"

"Just go," he said, and there was an edge of panic in his voice. "_Now_. Ammunition and any other supplies you can carry. Meet me in BRIC."

"Korsak—"

"_Now_, Detective," Korsak said, his tone brooking no argument. Jane watched him as she crossed to the door. He sat at his desk, his head in his hands.

"What the fuck is going on?" she demanded, as all around them people were running from office to office, their arms full of papers, glued to their phones. Frost shrugged. Nobody they saw was talking out loud. Nobody was saying anything at all. It was eerily quiet in the precinct considering the dozens of people rushing past them. "Broward!" she shouted to a young deputy who was carrying a large Styrofoam crate. "What the fuck is going on?"

Broward shrugged, his face twisted with anxiety. "Something big, I guess," he said, his voice tight. "I gotta take all these blood samples down to the morgue."

"I'll do it," Jane said, grabbing the crate. "I'm going down to evidence anyway." Maybe Maura would know something.

"What—what should _I_ do?" Broward looked panicked.

"Ask your CO," Jane called over her shoulder. "You can tell him I got this."

She strode down the hall, Frost just behind her, as Broward floundered helplessly for a moment before wheeling around and heading back to wherever he'd come running from.

"This seems big, Jane," Frost said, struggling to keep up with her.

"Yeah," Jane muttered as a mouse of a woman in a pencil skirt nearly careened into her, barely holding on to the stack of first-aid kits she was carrying out of a supply closet. "_What_, though? Why won't anyone talk to us?"

"Nobody looks like they're talking to anyone," Frost said as a terrified-looking young clerk glanced up from his phone, his fingers still working the buttons as he looked away from the screen. He caught Jane's eye and looked back down, frowning furiously.

"This is freaking me out, man," she said, kicking at the door to the morgue.

"Not just you," Frost said, taking a deep breath as they pushed through into the autopsy room.

Inside everything was cool and dim, a single brilliant light shining from the center of the room.

"Distinct tread marks across the lower quadrant from the gluteal fold to the first lumbar vertebra," Maura said, her voice soft but clear. It hardly seemed to disturb the stillness of the space. It felt like Jane had stepped into another universe after the mysterious panic of the upper floors. "Reminiscent of the rear passenger tire of a medium-sized sedan. Though I'll have to send an impression to the lab to be sure," she added.

"Maura," Jane said impatiently.

Maura didn't look up.

"One moment please," she said evenly. "I'm nearly finished with my initial external examination."

"I don't think we have a moment," Jane said, setting the crate of blood samples on the counter. "Do you have any idea what's going on upstairs? Or with that siren outside?"

"This room is nearly soundproof," Maura replied, still not looking up from the body.

"Well, there was this weird siren that none of us had heard before, like an emergency signal, you know, like the storm signals, but louder, more intense, and Korsak told us to go to evidence and get guns, and everybody upstairs is running around like . . . I don't know, like zombies are attacking or something."

"Zombies as portrayed in popular culture are a far cry from their origins in Haitian-" Maura was cut off as an enormous explosion suddenly rocked the foundations of the building.

"Get down!" Jane shouted, pushing Maura to her knees. "Get under the table! Frost! Get down!" Maura wiggled between the support bars, curling up beneath the autopsy table. Another explosion caused jars and utensils to rattle off shelves, smashing to the floor. Jane ducked low, crouching at the side of the table.

Maura reached out and grabbed her wrist. "Get under here, Jane!" she cried.

"I can't-"

"Now!" Maura shouted, tugging at her arm sharply. A third explosion. Broken glass and unidentified liquids swirled together on the concrete floor, the air turning sharp and acrid. Jane squeezed under the table, wincing as she realized the corpse's hand had flopped listlessly over the edge.

"Jane, what's going on?" Maura's voice was suffused with panic. "What are those explosions?"

"I don't know, Maura," Jane replied tersely. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," Maura said quickly. "You?"

"Yeah, fine. Frost, you okay?"

"I'm good," Frost called from inside an empty steel cabinet.

"We have to get back upstairs," Jane said. "We have to find out what's happening."

"We gotta get the weapons for Korsak," Frost reminded her. "Seems pretty important now."

"You go," Jane said. "Yeah? You run down to evidence, get what you can carry—Maura, do you have a box or a sack or something?" Maura nodded, pointed at a cupboard door. "Get what you can carry, take it up to Korsak. We'll meet you there."

"You sure?"

"Frost, just _go!" _Jane cried as the red emergency lights began flashing throughout the morgue. The fire doors sealing the morgue off from the rest of the precinct began dropping, with huge rattling groans. "_Now!" _Jane shouted. Frost didn't say another word, didn't even glance back at Jane before bolting out of the room just as the heavy steel door thundered down.

Jane and Maura sat for a moment in stunned silence.

"You okay?" Jane asked, not looking at Maura. Not seeming to talk to her, really.

"Still fine," Maura breathed. "You?"

"Yeah," Jane muttered. "Are we trapped in here?"

"Functionally, yes," Maura said. "This room was built to contain biohazardous waste in the event of a contamination or other emergency.

"So we're trapped in here." Jane wrenched herself free of the table, began pacing up and down the room. "I gotta get out of here, Maura. _We _have to get out of here."

"For all we know, Jane," Maura said, pulling herself upright again, "this might be the safest place in the building. It's fully encased in poured concrete, lined with rebar, below ground level, and—as you can see—it's quite internally secure."

"But I don't know what's _happening_, Maura!" Jane shouted, gesturing frantically. "Someone is firing bombs at BPD, is what it sounds like, but I don't know if that's true. And the sirens, and everyone acting so weird, and Korsak asking for evidence guns—Maura, _we can't stay here_."

"Well I don't know how to get us out, Jane!" Maura cried, and Jane suddenly realized how bewildered and terrified she was.

"Maura," she said, crossing to her and taking Maura's hands in her own. "It's going to be okay."

"You don't even know what's going on."

"I know. I—I know. But we have to stay calm, we have to focus. Now. Is there any way you can think of to get us out of this room?"

Maura took a deep breath, her eyes wide. "No," she whispered. "Like I said, it's designed to contain biohazardous materials."

"So why did it go off now? There's nothing hazardous in here."

"I don't know," Maura frowned, biting her lip. "Maybe the force of the explosions?"

"Yeah," Jane said, giving Maura's hands a quick squeeze before resuming her anxious pacing. "Okay. Well, this could be good for now, I mean, there's medical supplies in here-" she glanced at the mess on the floor. "Some, anyway. A receptionist on the second floor nearly ran into me 'cause she couldn't see over a stack of first-aid kits. So let's assume we'll be needing as many emergency supplies as we can get our hands on."

"What is it, Jane?" Maura whispered, her face ice-white, translucent with fear. "What's going on?"

"I wish I knew," Jane said, "but I'm sure once we know we'll wish we didn't."

* * *

Jane wished she'd stayed locked in the autopsy room.

She sighed, brushed some crumbled concrete from the stock of her rifle. It was everywhere; in the cuffs of her shirt, in her socks, in her hair. Nearly every building had been damaged, many to the point of uselessness. She strode past the hollowed shells of restaurants, of boutiques and bookstores and coffee shops. A tattered awning flapped in the breeze, its twisted steel frame half-suspended from a cracked brick façade.

"Anything?" she said, lifting the brim of her cap and wiping her brow.

Frost squinted, surveying the ruined landscape. "Nothing I can see."

They set off walking again.

"Mine!" Jane shouted, a moment before Frost put his foot on it.

"Damn," he said, taking a wide berth around the dull metal cylinder. "You got eagle eyes, Jane."

"Yeah, well, Death always whistles, lets me know he's coming," she said, adjusting her bandolier. The long, gleaming hunting knife at her shoulder slipped a centimeter out of its holster, glinting white in the blazing sun.

"What's the song? I'm gonna guess ABBA." Frost knelt down to tighten the laces of his boot.

"Blue Oyster Cult," Jane said, grinning crookedly. "At least he's got a sense of humor."

"Hysterical," Frost replied dryly. "Hey Jane," he said. "Look at this." He sifted through the dirt and debris, pulling a ripped and stained sheet of newspaper out from under a large piece of roofing tile. "President Declares State of Emergency," he read. "Remember that?"

"Like it was yesterday," Jane said, her voice edged with sarcasm. "No," she went on after a brief pause, an inestimable weariness coloring her words. "I don't actually remember it. Do you?"

"No," Frost said quietly. "Not really."

"Longest month of my life," she muttered. "But hey, at least I still got one."

They stood there, Jane's foot propped up on the bumper of an overturned Honda. She planted her hands on her waist, elbows out. "There's got to be something out here," she said.

"Yeah. It's so quiet."

"_Too _quiet," Jane replied, raising one eyebrow. Frost chuckled.

"Don't go singing the chorus just to get his attention, now," he said, continuing on down the empty street.

Jane shook her head, smiling ruefully as she followed after him. "Hold up," she said, stopping abruptly in front of a blasted-out building. "Didn't this used to be a pharmacy?"

"Yeah," Frost said, peering at the scarred wreckage. "But judging from the looks of it we're not gonna find much."

"You never know." Jane slung her rifle around her back. "I told Maura we'd look everywhere."

"I'll keep watch," Frost said, climbing up the ruined walls, positioning himself at what had been the corner of the roof.

"Thanks," Jane called, already pulling chunks of drywall and splinters of toppled shelves aside, searching for anything Maura could use at the hospital. _Bandages. Dressings. Tape. Any drugs you can find. Insulin, morphine, penicillin. Needles. Alcohol. Anything, Jane. Anything will help. _

She had pulled a piece of acoustic tile off what turned out to be a steel cabinet. "Damn it," she muttered, kicking at the lock.

"Problem?" Frost called from the roof.

"This thing's locked." She put her hands on her waist again. Looked from the cabinet to Frost and back again. "I'm gonna shoot it open, you think it's okay?"

Frost stood a little taller, carefully scrutinizing the streets around them. "Looks okay."

"Okay." Jane pulled her revolver from her waistband, chambering a bullet as quietly as she could though she felt immediately stupid, knowing that the report of the gunshot would be loud enough to attract the attention of anything that might be lurking nearby, waiting for them. She took a deep breath, glanced up toward the sky for half a second, then aimed and squeezed the trigger.

The sharp blast of the gunshot ricocheted off the hollowed-out buildings, the flipped and twisted cars, it seemed as though the very sky itself sent the sound crashing back down around them. Jane held her breath, motionless.

"Clear," Frost called after what felt like hours. She exhaled, her breath long and shaky. Holstering her weapon, she nudged the cabinet open with the toe of her boot.

"Jackpot," she breathed. Rows of tiny glass vials glinted in the sun, lining the inside of each of the doors. Contained within the cabinet itself were tidy white boxes, each marked with a simple picture of its contents—bandages of various sizes, some sterile needles, alcohol and iodine-soaked pads.

"Got something," she called up to Frost.

"Will the doctor be pleased?"

"It'll be like finding out she can wear heels again," Jane said, unzipping her pack. She pulled out a long piece of torn cloth and carefully set the vials on it, wrapping them gently. "Looks like insulin. Here's some . . . thing, it ends with –codone so that's probably good, right?"

Frost hopped down from his perch and joined her at the cabinet. "Nice," he whistled. "You might even get hot water tonight."

"If anyone should get hot water it's you," Jane said. Frost looked momentarily pleased, until she added "because I'm amazed the crawlers can't find you just by the smell."

He pursed his lips, punching Jane's arm.

"Help me get this stuff packed up," she said, returning to her careful binding of the vials. Frost set his own pack down, unzipped it. They worked in silence, emptying the cabinet of as much as they could carry before securing their packs and turning back toward the road.

They froze.

"Crawlers," Jane whispered.

"Yeah," Frost replied, so quietly it was nearly just breath.

"Do they see us?"

"They always see us."

A pebble clanged down from the ruined roof, hitting the now-empty steel cabinet with a sharp _ping_.

The crawlers popped their heads up one by one.

"Fuck," Jane whispered. "Seven of 'em."

"I got bullets if you do," Frost said, reaching slowly for his revolver.

"Yeah," Jane said, tugging at the butt of her rifle as subtly as she could. "You ready?"

"Born ready," Frost said, whipping his revolver into the open air. Jane slung the rifle around with blinding speed, both of them opening fire before the crawlers had a chance to start moving. Thin, high-pitched shrieks mixed with the deafening gunshots, then the dull sound of heavy flesh striking concrete as the echo of the blasts shimmered away in the heat.

"How many bodies you see?" Frost was checking his clip. "I got nine shots off."

"That's a little overkill, don't you—what?" she stared at Frost, who was looking at her skeptically.

"Uh," he said, motioning to her feet, where at least twenty shell casings lay scattered among the debris.

"This is an automatic weapon, Detective Frost," she said. "Highly illegal in large part due to its rapid deployment of ballistic material."

"Uh-huh."

"That's why I picked it," Jane grinned. "Kablow! No more crawlers."

"Let's make sure there really _are_ no more crawlers before we start with the sound effects." Frost crept around to a short piece of still-standing wall, chambering a bullet. "Clear to the southwest," he said after a moment.

"Northwest's clear too. We go straight out, do the thing, check the eastern perimeter, get the hell back to the hospital, deal?"

Frost grimaced. "As long as you do the thing."

"I always do the thing!" Jane said in mock-offense. "When have I ever made you do the thing?"

"Let's just get out of here," Frost glanced around. "We gotta let 'em know the crawlers are back in this sector."

"Yeah," Jane said, "plus, it's almost time for dinner! Can you wait for brown bread, because I, my friend, cannot _wait_ for brown bread."

"I don't even know if you're being sarcastic any more," Frost said, shaking his head.

"I don't either, to be totally honest," Jane said, hopping over the shattered foundation. "Okay. You keep watch from behind that Volvo, I'll go do the thing."

"Got it." Frost trotted off, his gun still out. Jane took a breath and approached the first body, balling her hands into fists as she drew up on it.

It wasn't moving. Its skin was the same mottled yellow-purple-black as all the crawlers, like a living bruise.

_Not living, though. Not really_.

She always had to remind herself. It made doing the thing easier.

She kicked at its torso. Nothing.

Taking another deep breath she glanced at Frost, who nodded at her from behind the car. She returned the nod, then slipped the foot-long knife out of its shoulder holster.

_Just do the damn thing_.

Jane gripped the handle tightly, bringing the knife up over her head and dropping it down with all the force she could muster. There was a familiar sick liquid splat, she always thought it was like cutting into a half-rotted melon, but then the sudden resistance, the abrupt density of the bone. She wrenched the knife with a practiced twist of her hands, sending the crawler's head flying a few feet away. These ones were old. They were so soft and decayed the heads hardly bounced at all.

"Only one point for that one," she shouted to Frost.

"Come on, Janie!" he called back. "Go for a personal best!"

She sighed, chuckled, moved toward the next putrid lump of flesh.

"I could do this all day," she shouted, the second head bouncing and splitting on the corner of what remained of a lamppost.

"Let's not, though," Frost shouted back. "Sun's not gonna stay out forever."

"Yeah," Jane said. She moved quickly to the five remaining crawlers. Did the thing. Wiped her knife on the decaying fabric still clinging to one of them. Slipped it back in the holster.

"Hot water," she mumbled to herself. "That woman better run me a fucking _bubble bath_."

She reshouldered her pack, strode back to Frost. "Come on," she said. "This place gives me the creeps.


	3. Signal Fires

It was nearly dark. It was nearly dark, and they weren't back yet.

Maura paced around her small room, unconsciously worrying at the silver ring she still wore on her right hand. Everything else, everything of real value, had been locked in a safe that was now buried beneath the rubble of what had been her house. She had kept one, though, simple in design, didn't get caught on anything, didn't get dirt or gore packed into its crevices, because she needed to have a reminder that things had not always been just blood and death and fear, that the possibility of beauty still existed somewhere.

She saw something moving out of the corner of her eye. She pulled the pistol from her thigh holster without thinking, approaching the window obliquely, weapon at the ready. It had only been a few weeks since she'd discovered the necessity of handling firearms, and she had been grateful that shooting a gun had come as easily to her as suturing an incision or _savasana_. She'd impressed Jane with her ability, she'd been good enough to make Jane feel confident about leaving her in charge of the safety of the hospital while she went ranging during the day.

Even on days like today, when they'd had visitors.

_If it moves, shoot it_.

Jane's last words to her before she'd left on that first day, after they'd barricaded what was left of the hospital, after they'd set up the rough perimeter of carefully-scavenged land mines, pits, spikes. Anything they could find that would slow someone down. Slow some_thing_ down.

"Do you know how to shoot a rifle?"

Maura had shaken her head, biting her lip.

"Okay," Jane had said, hefting the weapon up from the crate Frost had managed to put together before BPD had been shelled into near-oblivion, "this is a .30-06 caliber M21 sniper rifle."

"Okay."

"It's a semi-automatic weapon, which means all you have to do is keep pulling the trigger and it'll keep firing."

"Okay."

"But you don't want to pull the trigger too much, okay?"

"Okay."

"Come over here."

Maura had crossed to Jane, still moving as though she was living in a dream. They all did sometimes, especially the blank-eyed women who had lost their children, who now drifted like ghosts down the few intact corridors of the hospital. Maura had quickly learned she needed to assign guards to the exits and the highest accessible points. It had only taken one grief-stricken mother plunging from what was left of the roof, and the crawlers that had crept out of the shadows to mourn with them, to teach her that.

"Okay," Jane breathed, standing close behind her, arms around Maura's body, guiding her hands. "It's gonna kick, so you want to have the stock braced against your shoulder and be ready for it, all right?"

"All right," Maura had said, and even though they had recently survived the end of the world, even though they were fighting a war they had to win, she felt her heartbeat quicken slightly as Jane pressed tightly against her.

_Intimacy is a balm_, she thought. _Social animals crave it when in the midst of extraordinarily stressful circumstances, and this_—

"Squeeze," Jane whispered directly into her ear, her hand warm on top of Maura's.

Maura pulled the trigger, bracing herself. Jane's body pressed against hers had the added benefit of helping to absorb the kick.

"Okay, good, but next time aim at something."

Maura blushed, adjusted the rifle so she was aiming at a large _X_ spray-painted on a piece of partially-demolished stone wall.

"Don't close your eyes," Jane whispered.

"I won't," Maura whispered back, taking a short breath and squeezing the trigger. The center of the _X_ disappeared in a puff of powdered rock, leaving a fist-sized hole.

"Good!" Jane cried, dropping her arms. "Really good, Maura. Try it again."

They'd had target practice with the M21 and a Walther PPK with the barrel filed down. "Now nobody will know it was you, at least," Jane joked. Maura smiled but it was thin, unconvincing; she had realized after several minutes of shooting at rocks and windowpanes that the reason she was holding these guns was that eventually she would be shooting to defend her life. The lives of all the people who had sought refuge in the hospital.

Some of the women they'd found, some of the women who had found them, were strong, unhurt, knew about fighting or were quick learners. Maura was relieved when Jane had looked over their makeshift crew of guards, had nodded her head. Gail and Donna were experienced shooters; they occupied the highest points of the hospital, acted as snipers and scouts. Pam and Celeste and Marina all had good knowledge of basic self-defense, Jane had instructed them to teach all the women and the children old enough to learn. And Diana had been an Army nurse.

They were perhaps a hundred all told, all adult women and children, either with their mothers or newly alone, orphaned by the event. Like Carrie, the tiny red-headed girl who was good at seeing things, who had dragged her sleeping mat to the space just outside Maura's door.

Maura trained her eyes on the courtyard. Her room was on the second floor, in what had been an administrative office of some kind. They'd pushed the heavy filing cabinets to one side, positioning them so they'd be easy to topple to create more barricades should it come to that. Sometimes Maura felt guilty about having her own space when so many of the refugees were sleeping four or five to a room, but Diana, the Army nurse who had become Maura's closest working companion and friend when Jane was out on her rounds, had assuaged her anxieties.

"Nobody resents you, Doctor," she'd said. "They all look up to you. After all, you and Detective Rizzoli, you saved us."

"Hardly," Maura had scoffed, blushing. "And please, I've asked you to call me Maura more times than I can even remember."

"Training," Diana shrugged. "You outrank me. I mean, in the practical sense."

"Well, in the personal sense I would vastly prefer if you'd call me Maura," she'd said, smiling. Diana was smart and strong, had come in with a young boy who had been hit by shrapnel from a land mine, had really been the one who'd saved the boy's life, though Maura had received the credit since it had been in her hospital.

_My hospital_.

The women did look up to her, it was true, though Maura was unsure how she felt about being anything other than a doctor. "I'm no good at leading people," she'd said just before Jane had set off on that first day.

"So," Jane had replied, "get a deputy. And don't make any dumb rules, people hate dumb rules."

"Like what?" she'd said, her voice filled with mounting panic. Jane had simply smiled and shaken her head, double-checking that her enormous knife was secure, that she had a good supply of ammunition.

"You'll do great," she'd said, putting her hand on Maura's arm. "And anyway, I'll be back in a few hours. Hopefully with some presents!"

"I like presents," Maura had admitted, trying to smile for Jane's sake. "Anything you can find. Bandages. Dressings. Tape. Drugs of any kind. Anything, Jane. Anything will help."

Jane had nodded, adjusting her cap. "This weather's weird," she said, squinting at the sun. "Never this hot this late in the year."

"Yeah," Maura had said skeptically, looking around at the cratered remains of the hospital she'd interned at what felt like centuries ago, now. "It's the weather that's weird."

Jane smiled at her, squeezed her elbow. "Remember, Maura. If it moves, shoot it."

Maura nodded, her hand moving to the butt of her pistol.

"Frost!" Jane called. He emerged from a low, solidly-built annex that they had all decided would be a safe enough space for any older boys or men they ran across. So far it had been almost all women, mothers, mostly. Maura didn't know why that was; the question remained submerged in her brain. Jane turned to wave at Maura as she and Frost picked their way around the land mines and other traps they'd set, disappearing through the north entrance. Maura had watched until she was sure she couldn't see their shadows any more, then turned back to the hospital.

That first evening had been torment, waiting for Jane and Frost to return. There was still extremely limited information about what had happened, exactly, nobody seemed to know precisely who they were fighting against, or what, or why, but the act of surviving had become paramount to all of them. Maura had paced the makeshift guard's walk at the northwest end of the hospital, scanning the horizon for any sign. She focused on her breathing. She twisted at her ring. Finally she'd seen them, dusty and lugging something large and unwieldy, it looked like a sledge or a stretcher.

She resisted the urge to call out. They'd all quickly learned silence was one of their most valuable assets; the crawlers were attracted to sound and movement. They were attracted to the smell of blood.

It took them what felt to Maura like years to carefully navigate the booby-trapped courtyard, struggling with their heavy load. When they finally arrived at the main doors to the hospital Maura had to consciously restrain herself from throwing her arms around each of them.

"What did you get?"

"Good stuff," Jane panted. Both she and Frost were clearly exhausted. "We found a bunch of first-aid kits in an old supply house, but most of the stuff was broken or blown up. We took what we could carry, though."

"Thank you," Maura said. "This will be very useful. Did you see . . . anything?"

"Yeah," Frost said. "Three or four. We took care of 'em. Way out in Mission Hill, though, not close to here."

"That's good," Maura said because she didn't know what else to say.

"Is there any food?"

"Yes, of course, let me help you get this inside. They're just finishing dinner."

"Did you eat?" Jane asked her, quietly.

Maura shrugged. "I wanted to make sure everybody else did first."

Jane smiled, though her eyes were tinted with concern. "You can't make a habit of that, Maura."

"I won't," she said, unconvincingly.

"I told you you'd be good at this," Jane smiled again. "But you have to take care of yourself, you're the only doctor we've got."

Fortunately, only a few days passed before Diana had arrived, carrying the boy whose leg was badly hurt. Maura's relief at having another experienced medical practitioner at the hospital had nearly overwhelmed her; it hadn't been long but the first few days had been a nonstop barrage of screaming children, frantic mothers, blood and burns and broken bones. With someone else to assist her she might be able to get some sleep, might be able to think again. Diana had helped organize a basic first-aid class, teaching refugees how to tend to minor injuries, to change dressings, to be of comfort to each other. Maura liked her very much, she was calm, steady, smart.

"Dr. Isles," she'd said, "I saw three combat tours. This feels like home."

"Please," Maura had said, the first of many times, "call me Maura."

She shook her head. She'd gotten lost in thought, an immensely dangerous thing to do. She pressed against the windowsill, pistol in her hand, surveying the courtyard. It was nearly dark and they weren't back yet.

She scanned the landscape, trying to see the movement that had caught her eye. _There. The north entrance. Shapes._

Maura aimed the pistol. She held her breath. _If it moves, shoot it_.

She was about to pull the trigger when she caught a series of three short, bright flashes. _Jane_.

Relief flooded through her. They'd settled on the signal early on; three quick flashes to indicate they were known, safe, that they weren't crawlers or scavengers or any of the thousand evils that spring up in the world once everything has been turned on its head.

The sun was just beginning to sink over the horizon by the time Jane and Frost had made it to the front doors. Even though it was a relatively small courtyard the elaborate defenses they'd managed to erect made navigation a challenge, even to Jane and Frost who had designed most of it, and it could often take half an hour to get from the north gate to the main building entrance.

"You're back," Maura said, her voice expressionless. She found it harder and harder to stop emotions once they started, so she'd worked at making herself immune. It was easier, more practical, to not feel anything, to not let herself feel anything, not even the familiar gratitude and relief every time Jane returned from the outside.

"Yeah," Jane said, adjusting her pack, clearly wanting to set it down. "Sorry we're so late."

"I was worried," Maura said. "It's almost dark."

"Wait 'til you see what we brought you, though," Jane dropped the pack to the ground, kneeling to unzip it.

"Uh, Jane?" Frost's voice was a little strained. "Maybe we should get inside."

"Oh, yeah," Jane said, slinging the pack over one shoulder.

"Why are you so late?" Maura asked, trying not to sound anxious or accusing.

"Crawlers," Frost said. "Seven. Tremont, other side of the turnpike."

Maura said nothing, but held the door for them. She didn't like to think about the crawlers. Nobody did. But to think of Jane and Frost out there, seeing them, killing them in the open air—Maura shivered faintly.

"We had visitors today," she said softly as they climbed the stairs to Maura's room, where many of the more valuable supplies were kept.

"Crawlers?" Jane's voice was immediately hard, serious. She reflexively reached out and clasped Maura's arm. "How many? Did they get in? Was anybody hurt?"

"Only two, and I took care of them. From the window, before they even had a chance to get blown up by the mines."

"I don't like that they're still hanging around here," Jane muttered.

"You think I do?"

Jane frowned slightly. "I know. But . . . I worry. About you. About everybody," she said quickly.

"I worry about you too, Jane," Maura replied. "And Frost. When it gets late like this, I start to-" she stopped. "Never mind. Show me what you found."

"Frost says it should get me hot water tonight," Jane said, her voice tinged with triumph.

"We'll see about that," Maura said, glancing at Frost, who was smiling wearily. "Barry, why don't you go find something to eat, dinner's done but I made sure they kept something for both of you. Jane," she said, turning to the other woman, "you're hurt."

"I am?" Jane glanced down at herself, surprised to see a spot of blood on her shirt. "What is that?"

"Looks like a minor abrasion on your arm, but I don't want to risk infection. Go on," she waved Frost out of the room. "You need to eat."

"Did _you_ eat, Maura?" Jane asked as Frost disappeared down the hallway. Maura shrugged.

"We've talked about this!" Jane cried, throwing her hands in to the air. "Maura, you are too important to neglect your own health. I know you think you can just go on like nothing's wrong-"

"Is that what you think, Jane?" Maura cut her off, feeling a sudden flush of anger swell in her gut. "Do you think I just sit here all day staring out the window, thinking about shoes? That I don't eat because I'm too busy pretending like everything is fine? Do you honestly think that in between changing dressings and amputating limbs and convincing women whose babies were killed not to throw themselves off the roof, do you _honestly_ think-"

"I'm sorry," Jane said abruptly, reaching out. Maura flinched. "Maura, I'm sorry."

"Let me see your arm," she said.

Jane held it out. There was a long scratch, not deep but still worth cleaning. "Nail or something," Jane mumbled. "Sorry."

"This will sting a little bit," Maura said, opening one of the iodine swabs. Jane sucked in her breath as the iodine fizzed on the wound. She was applying a strip of gauze when there was a small knock on the door.

"Come in," she said. Everyone in the hospital knew where her room was; it was rarely a place of sanctuary.

"Maura?" a tiny voice called as the door creaked open. "I heard yelling, are you okay?"

Carrie poked her head into the room. Maura smiled widely. Jane looked confused.

"Everything's fine, Carrie," Maura said gently. "Come on in."

Carrie pushed the door open and marched over to Maura's side. She narrowed her eyes at Jane. "Who are you?" she asked suspiciously. "You smell like a garbage can."

"I feel like one too," Jane said as kindly as she could manage. Jane didn't know many of the refugees, since she spent most of her days on the outside.

"Carrie, this is my friend Jane," Maura said. "Jane, this is Carrie."

"It's nice to meet you, Carrie," Jane said, holding out her hand. Carrie folded her arms, still half-glaring at Jane.

"Why were you yelling at Maura?" she demanded.

"Carrie is my . . . new assistant," Maura smiled. "She's very good at seeing things."

"I'm sorry I yelled at Maura," Jane said, kneeling down. "Sometimes we get mad and we do things we don't mean to do."

"Is she your best friend?" Carrie asked, and Maura could tell Jane wasn't sure what the right answer was.

"Uh . . . yes? Maura's my best friend."

"You shouldn't yell at your best friend."

"I know," Jane sighed. "I said I was sorry. Plus, she yelled at me."

Carrie looked up at Maura expectantly.

"I'm sorry I yelled at you, Jane," Maura said, unable to keep from grinning.

"Do you have a best friend, Carrie?" Jane asked.

Carrie nodded, reaching up and taking Maura's hand in hers. "Maura's my best friend too."

Jane glanced up at Maura, who shrugged. _Orphan_, she mouthed. Jane nodded faintly.

"Well, Carrie," Maura said, "Jane and I have some things to talk about, so why don't you go see if the other children are still in the playroom?"

"The other kids are dumb," Carrie sighed, rolling her eyes dramatically. "But I _guess_ I could go see."

Maura smoothed her bangs and smiled. "Have fun, okay?"

"I _guess_," Carrie said as she bounded out the door.

"Cute kid," Jane said. "New assistant?"

"She's . . ." Maura didn't know why she was hesitant to tell Jane that she'd appointed a child to scout for crawlers, but something about it seemed so unnerving. "What did you find?"

"A jackpot," Jane said, unzipping hers and Frost's packs. "Remember that pharmacy just off Tremont? Well, most of it was bombed out but I found a locked cabinet that had . . . _ta-da_," she said, revealing the tiny glass vials. "Insulin, maybe some painkillers, and I found needles and more bandages and alcohol pads and stuff."

"Oh Jane," Maura breathed, her fingers fluttering over the supplies. "This is incredible." She looked up at Jane, an expression of total gratitude on her face. "Thank you," she whispered.

"Hey," Jane said, slightly uncomfortable, "it's my job."

Maura reached over and placed her hand on Jane's. "Thank you," she murmured again. They looked at each other wordlessly for a long moment.

_Intimacy is a balm_.

"You should get something to eat," Maura said. "I'm sure you're exhausted and hungry."

"Hot water?" Jane asked, raising her eyebrows. Maura smiled.

"I'll see what I can do."

"And you'll eat something?"

"Diana's coming up later, we've got some work to do. She usually brings me something."

"Uh-huh," Jane said, her tone oblique. "Well, if you want company not related to triage techniques-"

"I'll find you, and we can talk about dismembering corpses," Maura said, her voice slightly sardonic.

Jane smiled, raised her newly-bandaged arm in thanks. She turned to leave, then paused just outside the door.

"We're going to the bay tomorrow," she said, trying to sound casual.

"Jane," Maura gasped, taken slightly aback. "Why?"

"We got a tip about survivors."

"But Jane-"

"I know," Jane said. "We'll be safe. We're taking Donna, if that's all right. And we're making it a short trip."

"I can't stop you," Maura said, frowning. "Please be safe."

"I'm always safe."

"You always _think_ you're safe, and that's what worries me."

Jane sighed, crossed back to her. "Frost will be with me. He's even more of a chicken than you," she said lightly.

Maura offered a thin smile, trying to suppress the very recent memory of the way the crawlers' heads had exploded into putty in the courtyard, the way the shell casings had rung out as they hit the floor, the way Carrie had squeaked and covered her ears as Maura fired.

"I just—you say I'm important because I'm a doctor, Jane, but don't forget how much we need you," she whispered. "And Frost. You make people feel protected. You make _me_ feel protected."

Jane didn't say anything but briefly lifted her hand and touched Maura's cheek. "I'll be careful." She clapped her hands abruptly. "Dinner! And I fully expect the royal treatment with my shower tonight, Doctor. Two whole minutes of water so hot you'll have to treat me for second-degree burns."

"Oh, I don't think the water could possibly get that hot," Maura said as Jane shook her head, chuckling.

"I'll come by later," she said, disappearing out the door.

Maura watched Jane go, then sat and began sorting through the supplies she'd brought. It had been several days since she and Frost had found anything useful, and Maura's stores were dwindling. Every day brought a new refugee or two, a new set of wounds to treat. Maura was doing her best but she was still plagued by the guilt of not being able to fix everyone, to save everyone.

Their first camp funeral had been two weeks ago today. They had burned the girl's body in the south court, had made the children stay behind in the main building, away from the windows. The ashes had landed on Maura's cheek, soft as a caress.

_Intimacy is a balm_, she thought. _If it moves, shoot it._

_These are the ends of the spectrum now. These are the only things that matter._

* * *

A/N! Okay! Whoo! So this is going to be primarily a hardship-centric story, probably not a lot of fluff but SO MUCH ANGST. I realized last night that some people are going to have to die. I don't even know who yet, but when the stakes are this high there have to be consequences to match. I hope you will not be so mad you stop reading, I promise to make it worth your while! Please share word of this crazy story with anyone who might be interested, you guys, and I'm so thrilled you're as excited as I am about it!

PS: In case you didn't feel like Googling, Tartarus is the lowest level of Hades. In early Greek mythology, it's the place the Gods themselves were sent, and later became a place reserved for the worst of the worst, with terribly ironic punishments. It's as far from the earth as the earth is from the heavens, so basically it is an awful place devoid of hope? Whee!


	4. Hard Light

"Careful," Jane muttered as Frost lost his footing, sending a shower of pebbles tumbling down the pile of broken concrete.

"Yeah," he huffed, pulling himself up to the top of the southwestern point of Fort Independence, overlooking the bay. Most of the structure had survived the relentless bombings in the days right after the darkness had first come, the sturdy stone walls originally designed to withstand intense combat.

The bay had been the source of rumors since the darkness had come—that it was filled with crawlers, that it was the place they had come from, that there were black ops men with guns guarding some dark secret, that nobody who went there came back. Jane had heard all the stories, the legend building so quickly she would've assumed it had always been thought to be an evil place, had she not taken Jo Friday for a walk there only a few days before it happened.

_Jo_, she thought, a fleeting sadness rushing through her. She'd gone past her apartment building as soon as she'd been able, after the bombs blew out the side of the morgue—so much for Maura's theory that it was impenetrable—but had found only enormous piles of smoking rubble. Saw body parts scattered in the debris. Hadn't looked too close; it was entirely possible she'd shaken that hand in friendly greeting when it was still attached to a neighbor.

Still, it was easier to think about Jo Friday than it was to think about any of the others.

Korsak.

Frankie.

Ma.

_Oh Ma_.

Jane hadn't been able to determine how many of the people she loved had survived the destruction of those terrible days; all communication had been cut off, roads were impassible, danger was so present and so unknown that people clustered in the corners of basements for days, nights, without eating, without sleeping, without speaking. It had been Maura's idea to head for the hospital, in case there was anything she could do to help. "Just stay alive, Maura!" Jane had cried. "Don't put yourself in an even more dangerous situation!"

"Nobody _knows_ the situation, Jane!" Maura had shouted back. "And I have skills that are very valuable in situations like these! How selfish and cowardly do you think I am?"

"Don't be a hero, Maura," Jane had said softly. It had almost been the thing she'd meant to say. Almost.

"I'm not a hero, Jane," Maura had replied grimly. "I'm a doctor."

It had been easier to go with her than to fight. There might be something Jane could do to help.

The trip to the hospital, though less than two miles, took them nearly three days. Maura stopped and tended the wounded when she could, tearing strips off her skirt and jacket when she ran out of material from her scrubs. A few people began following them, women, mostly, with children, all of whom seemed comforted by Maura's calm professionalism. They seemed comforted by Jane's gun.

The second night they'd made it to Beacon Hill, and Maura paused in front of the wreckage of her own house. Jane put her arm around Maura's shoulders as they surveyed the nearly-flattened structure, squeezing Maura's arm. But Maura had taken off suddenly, walking quickly toward what remained.

"Maura!" Jane cried, running after her. "Don't go over there! It's not safe! You guys stay back," she shouted to the group of survivors they'd amassed.

"Safety means something else than it did last week," Maura called over her shoulder, pulling out a small flashlight she'd though to slip into her pocket while they were still trapped in the morgue. She switched it on, peering into the still-standing portions of the house.

"What if it comes down?"

"It won't," Maura said with such confidence that Jane shrugged and followed her in. For all Jane knew, Maura had a degree in architectural engineering to go along with the rest. She wouldn't put it past her.

"Oh good," Maura breathed, pushing aside all manner of debris. "My clothes!"

"Maura, really?"

"Yes, really," Maura had replied, indicating her tattered garments. "In case you hadn't noticed, most of what I _was_ wearing is now tied around the broken limbs of the greater metropolitan area."

"Yeah," Jane said, chastened. "Sorry."

"And you could probably do with some spare things too, since we don't know how long it will be before . . ." she drifted off.

"Okay, yeah. Do you think you have any backpacks or anything we can get to?"

They spent as long as they dared going through as much of what remained of Maura's house as they could. Finally, when beams began to creak ominously and plaster dust sifted down onto their heads, Jane insisted they get out. Maura took one last lingering look around the wreckage, then zipped her sturdy jacket up to her chin, slung her knapsack over her shoulder, and took Jane's hand as Jane helped her over the broken foundation.

"Of course you'd have an outfit for the apocalypse," Jane said lightly, trying to make Maura smile. "I like your boots."

"Corcoran steel-toed field boots," Maura said, clutching the small additional bag of medical supplies she'd manage to salvage from the only partially-destroyed master bathroom. "Exceptional durability and resistance to the elements."

"Well, you look badass," Jane smiled, even though Maura couldn't see her in the dark.

"Thanks," Maura said. "Do you think I'll get a gun? I feel like it would really complement the military cut of this jacket."

"I know the perfect little M16," Jane had said wryly. "Do you think that'll match?"

"It will," Maura had replied, smiling at Jane even though Jane couldn't see her in the dark.

_Please be safe, Maura_, she thought, hoisting herself up to the topmost point of the crumbling stone wall. _I need you to stay safe._

There had been rumors of survivors trying to hide in the old fort, but when Jane and Frost arrived, with the taciturn Donna in tow, they didn't see a single living soul.

Just bodies.

Thousands of them, in varying stages of decay, creating a dense layer on the top of what had once been pristine and picturesque Pleasure Bay. There were so many corpses they completely obscured the water in places, making it look as though the beach continued out, its soft golden sands turning an odd, sick yellow, then purple, then black.

"Jesus," Frost muttered, surveying the landscape.

"You okay?" Jane asked, not bothering to tease. The scene was grisly on a scale she couldn't comprehend; so horrifying her brain simply refused to process it.

Donna shifted the strap of her rifle and spat over the wall.

"Yeah," Frost breathed. Jane could tell he was working hard on maintaining his composure. Fortunately the wind favored them, blowing what Jane imagined was a powerful stench southward, out to sea. "What the hell happened?"

"Tides," Donna said, spitting again. She didn't talk much. Jane liked her.

"But the bay's closed in by the causeway."

Donna pointed out into the distance. "Not any more."

Jane peered in the direction of Donna's finger, shielding her eyes from the sun, which still beat down with an odd intensity given that it was early October. Sure enough, the Head Island Causeway, which had once tracked nearly a straight line from point to point, had disappeared. Jagged pieces of it still rose from the water, but most of it had been demolished.

"They didn't leave anything standing, did they," she said, whistling.

"We're fighting a war," Frost said.

"—and we have to win, yeah, I know. Still," Jane stared off at the broken chunks of road rising above the gently rippling surface of the water. "Seems like they could've left a building or two for the survivors. Like, oh, a hospital that wasn't bombed to shit."

"They didn't think there'd be any survivors," Donna said suddenly. It was the most she'd said to either of them since they'd left the hospital earlier that morning.

"What?" Jane turned to face her. "What are you talking about?" Her voice was half-interrogation, half-interest, utterly devoid of skepticism. She'd learned quickly in talking with the rare survivors they met that skepticism often did nothing but waste time.

Donna pursed her lips, readjusted her shoulder strap. "We were all supposed to die. Become crawlers," she corrected herself, "and _then_ die. And if we didn't, well, that's why all the bombs and the land mines and the fires."

"I dunno," Frost said, turning away from the corpse-clogged bay. "That sounds a little . . . out there. And who are 'they,' anyway?"

Donna shrugged. "Government, I guess."

Frost rolled his eyes, walked a distance down the exterior wall of the fort.

"He's a little . . . skeptical," Jane explained, though Donna didn't seem to have noticed his departure. If she did, she didn't care. She continued to stare out to sea, past the floating mat of corpses.

"Do you—" Jane was suddenly hesitant to speak to her. Something in Donna's assured silence made Jane slightly anxious, a feeling multiplied by how much of a luxury anxiety had become. "How do you know this?"

Donna reached into the side pocket of her cargo pants and fished out a plastic card, handing it to Jane without a word.

"Holy hell," Jane breathed after staring at the card for a moment. "You work for the State Department?"

"Did," Donna said. "When there was one."

"No wonder you're such a good shot." Donna had earned her place on the parapet by dropping two crawlers on opposite ends of the hospital courtyard within milliseconds. Jane knew Maura was a little afraid of her, of Donna's closed-off nature and her skill with a rifle—_don't stop to think about your own skill with a rifle, doc_—but holding the card it all made sense to Jane.

_She's a killer_.

"How long did you . . . uh . . . work for State?" she asked, handing the card back to Donna, who slipped it back into her pocket.

She shrugged again. "A while."

Jane knew there were more important things to think about, like the overwhelming number of corpses clogging Pleasure Bay, the near-certainty that crawlers were lurking nearby, the need to find any survivors who might be holed up in the fort complex, but she stopped for a moment, staring at Donna's impassive face.

"That's so cool," she whispered. Donna snorted, and Jane would've sworn she was smiling, just slightly.

"Jane!" Frost shouted, yanking Jane back into the present. "Crawlers!" Donna bolted away, heading for Frost, her rifle already in her hands. Jane followed after her, unsure for a moment if she should use her own rifle or one of the three pistols she had stashed on her body, finally grabbing for the Beretta at her waist.

"Where?" she shouted.

"Everywhere!" Frost yelled back, opening fire on the park below. Jane glanced down.

He was right.

Dozens of crawlers had appeared on the overgrown park lawns, their mottled bodies glistening in the sun. The uncanny way they had of lurching over the ground, like quasi-ambulatory larvae, was the thing Jane found most disturbing. Otherwise they were just corpses. But when they moved in that slow, inexorable way they had, half-stumble and half-slither, Jane was filled with a revulsion she couldn't abide.

"Kablow," she whispered, holstering the Beretta and slinging the M16 off her shoulder. The heavy blatting of gunfire filled the otherwise-tranquil park, the reedy screams of the crawlers barely penetrating the air.

Jane could hardly keep up with the slow tide, cutting down the front line only to realize there was another, and another, and another. Suddenly she realized something, something that made her gut twist and her heart sink.

"Frost!" she yelled over the din, "they're coming from the water!"

And so they were. She could barely make out the rippling edge of the mat of corpses, which she had at first thought was the motion of the tide pushing the bodies against the shore. Instead she watched with a growing horror as the bodies themselves heaved up onto the beach, squirming toward them.

"We have to go!" she screamed. "We'll never make it if we try to keep fighting them!" She ran up to Donna, who was picking off crawlers shot by shot, her calm air undisturbed by the chaos. "Donna, we have to go! Come on!"

Donna didn't seem interested in moving, though. Instead she shot mechanically, almost lazily, as Jane and Frost shouted at her to come with them before it was too late.

"Donna!" Jane cried again, desperately, tugging at the woman's arm. Donna turned to her.

"It's already too late, Detective," she said, and resumed fire.

* * *

"There you go," Maura said, leaving a soft kiss on top of the little boy's head. "Do you feel better?"

He looked at the fresh white bandage covering the slowly-healing infection on his forearm and nodded weakly. "Thank you," he whispered after a hesitant glance at his mother, who smiled encouragingly.

"Thank you, Dr. Isles," the mother said, tugging her son gently out of the chair. "He's doing much better."

"Just make sure he doesn't get it too dirty," Maura said. She looked at the boy. "Can you do that? I know it can get messy when you're playing, but it's very important to keep it clean so it gets better faster."

"You're going to do what the doctor says, right?" The woman stroked her son's unruly hair. He nodded.

"Okay," Maura said, standing upright. "Now, have fun, and I don't want to have to see you again until it's time to change that."

Maura had hoped Diana's first-aid course would have encouraged the mothers to handle the less-involved maintenance of their children's wounds, but she hadn't noticed an appreciable dip in the stream of patients filing through the makeshift clinic every day. She sighed. She sat at her desk, badly scarred but still sturdy, and closed her eyes for a brief moment.

"They really love you," Diana said, behind her. Maura jumped.

"You surprised me," she stammered. "I'm sorry."

"Why are _you_ sorry?" Diana smiled. "I'm the one who startled you."

Maura smiled, looked down. Diana had proven herself invaluable; beyond her medical knowledge she was unflappably calm, unfailingly pleasant, and almost unbelievably upbeat. Maura realized she'd come to rely on Diana's steady presence, especially since Jane had been moving farther and farther afield each day in search of supplies, of survivors, of answers. Diana was someone she could talk to, who understood the pressures she was under. More than that, Maura felt as though Diana understood who she was, as though if they'd met before, if they'd met in what Maura still privately termed _real life_, they would have been friends.

"What do you mean, they love me? Mothers have to drag their children in here, and then who even knows if they'll sit still long enough for treatment," Maura said ruefully, rising from her chair and perching on the edge of the desk.

"No," Diana smiled. "They love you. All of them. We taught everyone who was capable of learning how to change dressings. But they keep coming in here, day after day, so you'll do it for them."

"Well," Maura murmured, blushing. "I don't know if _that's_ true. Perhaps they're just lacking confidence and feel their children are being better tended to by a licensed professional."

"They like the way you talk to them. The moms _and_ the kids."

"Then why do the kids fight so hard?" Maura threw her hands up, deflecting the compliment. "Today Kevin O'Malley nearly gave me a black eye, he was kicking so hard when I tried to check his stitches."

"Because they're kids, Dr. Isles. Kids hate everything. And they're scared. And their moms are scared. But _you're_ not scared," Diana said softly.

"I'm terrified," Maura whispered. "Every minute I'm terrified. It's a little better when Jane is here, and it's a little worse when she's out there, where I don't know what's going on, if she's all right-"

"How long have you two been . . ." Diana drifted off meaningfully.

"Oh!" Maura cried, her blush deepening. "I didn't mean . . . _that_. We're not _together_, just—good friends."

"Oh," Diana said, "sorry."

"It's okay," Maura replied hastily. "We get that a lot. I suppose because we spend so much time together."

"You talk about each other a lot, too," Diana said.

"We—Jane talks about me?" She felt an immediate flush of embarrassment creeping up through her body.

"She does," Diana smiled. "She really wants to take care of you. That's why she spends so much time away, she wants to know she's doing everything she can to make sure you're safe."

"I'm sure she means the camp as a whole," Maura mumbled, unable to meet Diana's gaze. "Jane's a very compassionate person, once you get past her . . . occasionally difficult exterior."

"Jane's a hard bitch," Diana said matter-of-factly, "which is just what we need. But she cares about _you_. A _lot_," she finished, pointedly.

"When have you even talked to her?" The question came out of Maura in a rush, she hadn't intended to sound so incredulous.

Diana grinned at her. Maura had only ever seen her smile politely, in a friendly way, but the full mirth of the grin made Maura smile reflexively in return. "You'd be surprised how quickly night owls find each other," she said.

Maura smiled again. "I suppose I would," she said softly, smiling at Diana for what suddenly felt like half a second too long. She looked away for a moment, cleared her throat. "Did you need something?"

Diana smiled bashfully. "Well, actually-" she paused. Maura leaned forward, deeply curious. She hadn't known her long, it was true, but she also hadn't known Diana to get flustered by anything. But the way she was wringing her hands, was looking away, made Maura suddenly intensely interested.

Diana took a breath, opened her mouth.

"God _damn_ it!"

Jane burst into the room, throwing her pack down on the floor and starting to pace before noticing she'd walked in on the conversation. "Sorry," she muttered. "Sorry, Diana."

"Oh, it's fine," Diana said, looking almost grateful for the interruption. "I'll talk to you later, Dr. Isles," she called as she moved quickly out of the room.

"Maura," Maura called after her, then turned to Jane, who was pacing in tight circles in front of the desk. "Jane, what is going on?"

"We have to get out of here, Maura," Jane said, her voice tight. "We're not safe here any more."

"What happened?" Maura's face darkened, she felt a fresh coil of fear in her gut. "Jane, what-"

"We have to get everybody together and get them out of here as soon as possible."

"But where will we _go_? Some of them are very badly wounded, we can't move them!"

"Maura," Jane stopped, looked straight into her eyes. "They're coming."

* * *

Oh man.


	5. Soft Touch

"What do you mean, 'they're coming'?" Maura demanded. "Jane, what are you _talking_ about? Where's Frost? Where's Donna?"

Jane resumed pacing in her tight little circles. "Frost's at the annex, getting the boys ready. Donna didn't come back from the bay."

"Ready for what?" Jane didn't stop pacing, didn't respond. "Jane," Maura said, her voice suddenly hard, almost imperious. Jane stopped in her tracks. "_What is going on?_"

"We were out at the—the bay—and oh God, Maura, there were thousands of them, thousands, and then they were coming for us, and Donna wouldn't leave, she said it was too late, and Maura, Donna's in the CIA, I think, and she knows—or _knew_; I don't know if she made it—"

Maura could tell Jane wasn't able to stop the torrent of words, even though they were so garbled by the stress of whatever Jane had seen, whatever she had to communicate, that Maura didn't know exactly what Jane was talking about. She reached out and took Jane's hands.

"No, Maura! I can't, we don't have time-"

Maura squeezed Jane's hands hard, and forced her to sit down on the edge of the desk. "Jane," she said softly, soothingly. "Jane, I need you to focus and breathe and tell me, in order, what is happening. Okay?"

Jane could see Maura was using her bedside manner, wanted to resent her for it, but her breathing slowed. _No wonder everybody gets so attached to her._

"We went to Pleasure Bay, like I said. Frost and Donna were there. The bay was filled with corpses, Maura, it was _filled_ with them—"

"Breathe," Maura said, gently, kindly.

"Donna showed me a State Department ID and she said something about how there weren't supposed to be any survivors, that we were either supposed to become crawlers or die in the bombings and the fires after, if we lived that long."

"Okay."

"I believe her, Maura."

"Okay. What else?"

"Then the crawlers were coming for us across the park—but we were up on top of the fort—and then I saw—oh God, Maura, they were coming out of the water. There were thousands of them."

"Why didn't Donna come back with you?"

"She said it was already too late." Jane's voice was suddenly hollow, flat. "She said there was nothing we could do."

"But you came back here."

"Well, _yeah_," Jane said, abruptly switching back into action. "There's _always_ something you can do."

"Okay," Maura said, twisting at her ring. "So it's crawlers, then? Coming?"

Jane nodded. "Thousands of them. From Pleasure Bay." Maura raised an eyebrow. "I know," Jane groaned. "I _know_, right? Of all the places they could come from."

"How long do we have?" Maura knew there was no point in arguing about staying put; even though the hospital was well-barricaded they had to leave. The crawlers wouldn't be able to get into the courtyard or the main building, or those that did they could pick off from the window or the roof, but they wouldn't be able to get out, to find gasoline for the generators, to find food, to find water, to find medical supplies.

"Maybe two days. Maybe. I'm going to try to think of a place for us to go, out in the country. Less people, less crawlers."

"That makes sense, I guess," Maura said, frowning.

"Haven't you _ever_ seen a zombie movie?" Jane sighed. "No, probably not."

"But there are so many of us now," Maura was twisting her ring so hard her finger was turning scarlet. "And some can't be moved."

"Maura," Jane said softly, seriously, taking her hands and looking into her eyes. "We won't be able to take everyone."

"No!" Maura cried, wrenching away from Jane. "I'm not leaving anyone behind. This isn't their fault, they didn't ask for this, and all I can do is try to keep them safe, and alive, and-"

"Maura," Jane said again, her voice nearly a whisper. "You know we can't take everyone."

Maura turned away, staring out the window. She didn't say anything for a long moment.

"I know."

"I wish it wasn't like this, Maura, I really do."

"Please go, Jane," she said, her voice devoid of inflection.

"Maura-"

"Please. I need to think."

"Okay," Jane whispered, sliding off the desk. She hesitated at the door, turning back to see Maura silhouetted in the window, her hair glowing in the eerie light of the exceptionally late summer. Jane was taken for a moment by the way her deceptive fragility was amplified by the destruction all around her. She noticed Maura had gotten even thinner, wiry and hard, the softness of her face giving way to sharp angles that made Jane's heart ache. She frowned slightly, then kept going, down the hall, to find Frost.

Maura stood at the window until she saw Jane crossing from the main building to the low annex. She sighed, and moved to sit at her desk.

It would be her decision. How they did this. Who stayed and who left.

For the first time in weeks Maura felt tears stinging at her eyes. She had been so overwhelmed by the situation, by work and by fear and by the tremendous effort of suppressing that fear that she'd become almost totally numb to emotion of any kind. But this—

She found herself desperately wishing she hadn't sent Jane away, that Jane was there with her, comforting her.

_Intimacy is a balm_.

"I don't know how to do this," she whispered, a sudden wave of rage and frustration and terror and exhaustion crashing over her. She put her head in her hands, tears running down her wrists, leaving dark circles on the battered surface of her desk.

She didn't know how long she'd been like that, crying silently, unable to move, when she heard a soft knock at the door.

"Just a second," she called, trying to compose herself as quickly as possible. She brushed the tears from her face, wiped at the puddle on the desk with her sleeve. Took a deep breath.

"Dr. Isles?" Diana slowly pushed the door open but didn't enter the room. "Are you all right?"

"I'm—" Maura tried for a moment to put on a bright face, to pretend, but Diana's look of deep concern made her lose her will. "No," she said quietly.

"What's wrong?" Diana came in, closing the door behind her. "Dr. Isles, what's going on? Is it what Jane was so upset about? I saw her running over to the annex."

"Sit down," Maura said, indicating a nearby chair. "Diana, I don't know how to tell you what I'm about to tell you, and I need you to keep it a secret for as long as you can."

Diana's face darkened. She pulled the chair over to Maura's desk and clasped her hands together. "Of course."

"You may know that Jane was out at Pleasure Bay this morning," she began. Diana nodded. "There was an—incident, with the crawlers, the end result being we're not safe here any more."

Diana took a deep breath. Maura watched her features harden, shifting into a detached professionalism that she envied in that moment. "Okay," she said. "What do we have to do?"

"We have to . . . I don't know, Diana. I don't know what to do. We can't stay here, we can't stay in Boston. We have to leave the city, get out to where it's safer, where there are fewer people. Fewer crawlers," she corrected herself. "And there are so many of us now, and so many are sick or hurt and can't be moved."

"How long do we have?"

"Jane says two days."

"Not everyone can go," Diana said immediately, her voice measured.

Maura was briefly taken aback by how quickly both Jane and Diana had arrived at the same conclusion. Her first thoughts had been about caravans, barricades, about how they could defend themselves, but Jane and Diana had seen the cold truth of the situation. Her breath was shallow, she was trying not to cry again.

"I feel like this has become my decision, and I don't know if I can make it," she whispered. "Deciding who lives and who dies."

"If we stay here, we all die," Diana said gently, touching Maura's hand. "All of us. We're fighting a war and we have to win, and the only way we can live is if some of us stay alive to keep fighting."

Maura looked mournfully at Diana, unable to speak. She shook her head.

"I know," Diana murmured. "Nobody should have to make choices like this. But the world is different now than it was. The scales have been recalibrated. The only real decision left is one of mercy."

Maura couldn't allow herself to process the implications of what Diana was saying. She broke down in sobs, unable to hold back any longer.

Diana made a soft sound and gathered Maura into her arms, stroking her hair. Maura was so grateful for the contact, the comfort, that she broke into fresh sobs, her face buried in Diana's neck.

"I'm sorry," she choked after a few minutes. "I don't mean to be so-"

"Maura," Diana whispered, and Maura realized it was the first time the nurse had used her first name. "I'm going to stay here with them."

"What?" Maura gasped, tears still flowing freely. "Diana, no-"

"You're right," Diana went on as though Maura hadn't spoken. "We're not safe here any more, but Jane is also right, not all of us can leave. Only the able-bodied. Probably no children."

Maura tried to protest at that, but Diana shushed her softly, continued to stroke her hair, the light touch soothing despite her overwhelming anxieties.

"And we can't tell anyone," Diana went on. "They can't know. That's where mercy comes in, Doctor."

"But they'll find out soon enough," Maura said. "When this place is overrun with crawlers and the people strong enough to fight for them are gone."

"That's for me to worry about," Diana replied, her voice wavering slightly. "Please don't take it on, you can't. You have too much else."

Maura didn't want to think about what Diana wasn't saying. She focused on the gentle pressure of Diana's fingers smoothing her hair, the steady thrum of her heartbeat beneath Maura's ear.

"Will you stay with me for a minute?" she whispered, feeling very small and frightened. "I'm sorry if it's an inappropriate request, it's just . . ."

Diana laughed, startling Maura. "What?"

"Your definition of 'inappropriate' is very odd, Dr. Isles," Diana giggled. Maura smiled despite herself.

"Thank you," she murmured. Diana didn't say anything, though Maura found herself smiling again when she felt Diana's lips press softly against her forehead.

* * *

Jane found Frost rallying the handful of sullen teenage boys that had come with their families or been found on the streets.

"Come on, fellas!" he said. "Let's get going! Rob, take that box of bandages over to the clinic. AJ, I want you to take Tyrone and Luke and start reinforcing the southeast corner, I noticed some more of the stones fell. You might want to bring the hand truck." The boys nodded mutely, shrugging at one another. "Move it, guys!" Frost clapped his hands and the boys set off to their tasks. He turned to Jane. "Remember being a teenager?"

"Yeah," she said, smiling faintly. Frost's expression softened.

"Did you tell her?"

"Yeah."

"How'd she take it?"

"How do you think?" Jane kicked at a piece of rubble. "She thinks she has to make the choice."

"Well," Frost said quietly. "She sorta does, doesn't she? She knows who's hurt and who's not better than you do."

"But that's not what I meant!" Jane cried. "I didn't mean 'Maura, you have to decide who lives and who dies,' but what else are we supposed to _do_?"

"We gotta keep fighting, Jane," Frost said. "That's all we've got. And Dr. Isles is a smart woman, she knows you're right. There's nothing you can do about how it makes her feel. Not because you're not good at that—" he said quickly, "but because how can anyone make anyone feel better about something like that?"

"Thanks," she muttered. "What's the story?"

"I've got the guys reinforcing the camp."

"You didn't tell them anything, did you?"

Frost gave her a look. "Jane."

"Yeah. Sorry. It's just this whole thing is happening so fast, I can't really even think, you know?"

"I know," Frost said, beginning to pull boxes of ammunition out from under the low cots they'd found in a partially-demolished shed. "What do we need to do?"

"Just gather up all the ammunition you can," she said. "It's heavy, I know, but we're going to need it."

"What about . . . the rest of them?" he asked, keeping his voice as neutral as possible.

"I don't know," Jane said grimly. "Maura said she had to think."

"Maybe we should let her think about that, so we can think about what's next. It's hard, Jane," he put his arm on her shoulder and Jane recoiled slightly, unaccustomed to the familiarity. "But things are different now." He paused, coughed. "Do you have any ideas about where we can go?"

"Not really," Jane mumbled. "West, I guess. We need packs, and enough supplies to get us out of the city. We can go along the river until we find a place that seems safe, set up a camp."

"That's an idea," Frost said encouragingly. "Near fresh water, catching fish, shooting rabbits, it'll be like summer camp."

"Yeah, if summer camp involved a horde of zombies at your tail."

"Or like . . . what's that story about the little girl who lived on the prairie? You know the one."

"Uh, _Little House on the Prairie_? Frost, I had no idea you were into that kind of thing."

"Reruns," Frost grinned. "Better than homework."

"What I really want is a truck," Jane said, rubbing her hands together. "You seen any trucks around look like they work?"

"Even if you found one, what about gas? What about the roads?"

Jane looked at Frost, a deep sadness flickering across her face for half a second. "We've got enough gas here to run all the generators for a week without rationing."

"Yeah," he replied softly. "Okay. Yeah. There might be one down by the municipal complex, that's what, eight or nine blocks from here? If we go now we could know in a couple hours."

"Yeah," Jane said. "But if it doesn't work, that's a couple hours wasted."

"But if it does—"

"All right." Jane pulled the pistol from her belt, checked the clip. "Gimme five," she said. "I don't want to have to use 'em."

Frost poured the bullets into Jane's outstretched hand, then checked his own weapon. "Good to go," he said.

"Okay, I'm gonna go check on Maura." Jane took a deep breath.

"Good luck," Frost said, sincere.

Jane gave him a brief smile. "Thanks." She gave him an awkward punch on the arm as she headed back out the door.

"I'll meet you at the north gate in fifteen," he called after her.

"Yeah, okay," she shouted over her shoulder. She breathed deeply as she walked, trying to steady herself for whatever might happen when she saw Maura.

_It's not our fault, Maura, it's not your fault, things are different now. I don't want to have to do this to you and I'm so sorry, Maura, I'm so sorry, but we're fighting a war and we have to win_.

She climbed the steps to Maura's office quietly, uncertain of what was waiting. She took another deep breath and pushed softly on the door, which had been closed but not secured. It swung open soundlessly.

"Oh," Jane said abruptly.

Maura was sitting at her desk. Diana was sitting next to her. Diana's arms around her. Diana's lips pressed against her forehead.

"Sorry," she mumbled, backing out of the room, nearly tripping over her own feet.

"Jane?" she heard Maura call as she stumbled back down the stairs.

"Gonna look for a truck," she shouted hoarsely. "Back in a couple hours."

She burst out of the main entrance into the sun, which had taken on an eerie greenish cast. She saw Frost picking his way through the mines and barricades.

"Jane!" Maura shouted from the window.

"Back soon," she shouted back, not turning to look at her. She felt her face burning, an unexpected anger rising in her. _It's just the stress, Jane, calm down_.

She thought about the handful of conversations she'd had with Diana, late at night, rotating out the rooftop snipers so they could get a few hours of sleep.

_She really cares about you, Jane._

_I just want to keep her safe._

_She wants to keep you safe, too_.

"Watch it!" Frost shouted as Jane nearly took a wrong step onto a strip of broken glass they'd planted. She shook her head, focused on the gate, on the truck, on getting out of there.

Anything but the thing she'd just seen, which had for reasons she could hardly think to understand had struck her with more force than all the horror, all the death, all the madness she'd witnessed.

_I don't have time to think about this_, she told herself. And yet—

"You okay, Jane? That was fast," Frost said as she met him at the gate.

"Yeah," she said. "Let's get going, it'll be dark soon."

* * *

Drama!

Thank you all so much for your support and your reviews and your recommendations! This story is several barrels' worth of fun to write, and your love just makes it even _more_ fun!


	6. Night on the Sun

_I don't know how to do this_, Maura thought as she stared out the window. Jane had left nearly an hour before, something about finding a truck. Maura didn't know precisely why Jane had departed so abruptly, without explanation, but she had a faint fear it was because she'd walked in to find Diana embracing her.

Maura frowned. She found herself vaguely angry that Jane would be upset at the idea of someone hugging her when it seemed Jane was never there to do it herself. True, she had sent Jane away earlier, but she needed to think, she was overwhelmed for reasons that had nothing to do with Jane. She had regretted doing it. When Diana had held her it had been such a tremendous shock and relief, to have someone offer an embrace at a moment of such great trauma, to be there so uncritically, so openly. With Jane there was a distance, Maura realized, an unspoken, painful boundary that she had never really considered before.

Diana had simply offered. Maura had simply accepted. _Intimacy is a balm_.

She shook her head. She couldn't spend time thinking about this, not now, not when there was suddenly so much to think about, to do. Diana had flushed a deep pink when she saw Jane stumbling out of the room, had leapt up and made a hasty goodbye, something about seeing patients. They had both run away and yet Maura was still right there, standing in front of the window, trying to decide how to sentence children to death.

"Maura?"

Carrie was poking her head around the door, copper hair spilling over her eyes.

Maura's hand flew to her mouth as she choked back a sudden sob. "I'm busy right now, Carrie," she managed to say. "Go find some friends, okay?"

"I don't have any friends, Maura," Carrie said matter-of-factly. "Just you."

Maura pressed her fingers tightly to her mouth, squeezed her eyes shut, prayed Carrie wouldn't see how much pain she was in.

The little girl swung around on the doorknob. "I'll come back later, okay?"

"Okay," Maura half-gasped. She didn't move until she heard the door click shut. She rushed to it and flipped the lock, something she had not done since she'd take unofficial control of the hospital camp.

She stood at the door for a moment, then leaned against it and slid to the floor, burying her face in her hands.

Maura sat there, slumped against the door, unable to move. Gradually the pounding in her ears receded and she began to hear the clatter of the camp through the door; children running and playing, their high voices somehow still joyful despite the horror around them. Despite the horror they were facing.

_They can't know_.

How was she to communicate to those who _would_ be able to accompany them? To Pia, the pretty young landscaper, or to Celeste, the high-school English teacher? To Pam and Gail, both former Army Reservists? Kelly, the housewife whose husband and children had been lost to the bombs, who had been hiding in the freezer case of a supermarket when her apartment building had been destroyed? The teenagers, except the ones whose limbs Maura had to remove, whose fractures had not healed, who had been shellshocked into mute vacancy. All of them were uninjured, strong, relatively young. All of them could carry a pack. All of them wanted life.

How could she tell them without everyone finding out?

Maura pushed herself off the floor, took a deep breath. She poured water from the jar on the shelf behind the desk into her hands, splashed it on her face.

She felt she could trust Gail and Pam and Celeste, the women she'd assigned guard duty. But she wasn't sure. She didn't want the camp to find out what was about to happen, didn't want them to know she was abandoning them.

_I could stay_.

She paused.

Diana was staying. Maura realized she hadn't asked why, though she didn't know if it was her place. She had seemed so sure of her decision, though, and it seemed as though it hadn't taken her any time to make it.

_Unless she'd been thinking about it_.

Maura had not, she was a little surprised to discover, thought once about what would happen should the crawlers find them, not in a way that didn't involve her slim rifle. She had not given a moment's consideration to dying, only to what she needed to be doing to avoid it. But Diana was volunteering. Sacrificing herself.

For what?

_I don't know how to do this_.

She wanted Jane to come back. She was still angry when she thought about the way Jane had left earlier, but her anger faded when she thought about how safe she felt with her around. Like everything would be all right. Jane would protect her. Jane would protect her from _herself_.

She paced around the room for a few minutes, trying to address the impossible, when a low rumble outside the walls made her breath catch in her throat, her senses suddenly attenuated. She crept to the window, picking up her M21 and setting the barrel on the sill, keeping a low profile. She scanned the horizon looking for movement. She saw a small cloud of dirt and debris flying up from the north and quickly trained her weapon on it, her finger curled lightly around the trigger.

_If it moves, shoot it_.

The cloud of dirt was getting closer to the gates. Maura kept her gun focused just ahead of it; if she needed to shoot she had to make sure whatever it was didn't speed past the bullet. Maura hadn't been using a rifle long but she already prided herself on her marksmanship. It was one of the few skills she had gotten any practice in recently, and she was determined to allow some things to remain normal, including her need to perfect an art.

The rumbling got louder as the cloud came to a sudden halt outside the gates. Maura squinted as it dissipated, she thought she saw—

_Three flashes._

As the dust cleared she saw Jane standing on the runner board of a dented, but still clearly functioning, pickup truck. Frost was ahead of her, rolling back a piece of barbed wire they'd strung across the ungated entryway into the courtyard. She pulled the gun in, set it down next to the window, bolted from the room after struggling with the knob for a moment, remembering she'd locked it. A brief breath of anguish. Then through the door.

"Jane!" she cried as Jane and Frost made their way through the outer court. "You found a truck!"

"Yeah!" Jane cried happily, before seeming to catch herself. "It works, anyway," she continued, almost brusquely. "We figure we need to load the bed up with supplies, two in the cab plus the driver, maybe three in the back depending on how much we take."

"We're gonna go some of the clearer streets," Frost said. "See if we can find a couple more vehicles."

"How many do you think we need to fit, Maura?" Jane asked, folding her arms and looking into the distance.

Maura felt as though she'd been punched in the gut.

"Well I don't know, Jane," she said, her voice hard, poisonous. "How many would it be convenient for you to take?"

She turned and stalked back into the hospital.

Jane didn't follow her.

"What are you doing, Jane?" Frost hissed.

"What?" Jane nearly shouted. She heard Maura's office door slam, saw her shadow pass across the wall.

"Go in and apologize. Say something nice."

"What, Frost? What the fuck did I do? It's my fault she's mad because if we don't leave we'll be murdered by a thousand human-sized maggots?"

"No," Frost said through gritted teeth. "She's mad because she's got to leave behind a hundred women and children to be murdered by human-sized maggots. Now," he said, interrupting Jane's sound of protest, "you _go inside_ and you _say something nice_. I'm not gonna get this far just to have everything fall apart because you and Dr. Isles are having a lover's spat."

Jane had never seen him so angry, at least not with her. "We're not lovers," she said feebly.

"Jane-"

"Okay, okay," she said. "What should I say?"

"I don't know, how should I know? I'm gonna start moving supplies out here."

"Yeah," Jane muttered, rubbing the back of her neck and looking up at Maura's window. "Only—Frost?"

"What?"

"Don't let anyone see you doing it."

He sighed. "I got this, Jane."

"I know you do," she smiled. "Sorry."

_Go on_, he mouthed, flicking his hand in the direction of the door.

She threw him one last pleading look, but he simply turned and headed toward the annex. Jane sighed, looked briefly at the sky. It was beginning to turn a mottled purple-blue. Overlaid with that weird green-yellow light. Like a bruise.

She shivered despite the unseasonable warmth. It was nearing the middle of October and the temperature hadn't dipped below 75, except at night. _Summer and winter, they're mirrors_, a crazy old great-aunt had said. _You always see the reflection of the one in the other_.

_Been too hot for too long_, Jane thought. She pushed through the doors into the mostly-intact main lobby, turned up the stairs to Maura's room.

She paused just outside, set her shoulders, knocked on the door.

"Come in," Maura called. Jane took a deep breath.

"Maura, I'm sorry," she said as she pushed into the room. "I was a jerk, and I'm sorry."

"Do you know what you're sorry for?" Maura asked quietly. She was leaning against the desk, arms folded, her face vaguely sorrowful. Her voice wasn't cold or accusing, it was soft. Bruised.

Jane stood helplessly in front of her.

"Nurse Ericson has volunteered to stay behind when the convoy leaves," Maura said simply.

"Maura, I'm . . . not really sure what I should say," Jane lifted her palms in surrender. And, gently, "she's very brave."

"Yes," Maura said.

"You're very brave," Jane said, taking a step toward her. "Maura, you're incredibly brave. And strong and compassionate and smart," she paused, searching Maura's face. "And I don't think I could keep going if you weren't with me."

She tentatively reached out and put her hand on Maura's shoulder. Maura frowned, her brows knitting together. She looked down and Jane could see tears clinging to her eyelashes. She gripped Maura's shoulder a little more tightly.

Maura didn't look at her, but raised her hand and placed it on Jane's, giving it a soft squeeze. She sniffled. Jane froze, paralyzed by an old fear, a fear from before, almost comforting in its familiarity. She couldn't name it, though. Something about getting too close. She squeezed Maura's arm again in return, then withdrew her hand.

"I—uh, we have to go find another car before it gets too dark," she mumbled. "We should try to leave tomorrow."

"I thought you said two days," Maura said, a hint of hurt in her voice, in her eyes.

"At the most," Jane said. "At the least is better."

"Be careful." Maura turned toward the window.

"Maura—" Jane started before realizing she didn't know what to say next.

"Hmm?"

"I'm . . . I'm sorry you have to do this. I'm sorry I can't take this feeling away from you. I would if I could, you have to know that."

"I know," Maura said softly, still not looking at her. "Thank you. Be careful, Jane."

"I will," Jane said as earnestly as she could. "I promise."

With a last long look at Maura, she turned and headed back outside.

Maura watched as Jane jogged across the inner courtyard to Frost, who was piling boxes of supplies behind a large slab of broken concrete. They exchanged a short word, then headed out to the pickup truck. As Jane passed by Maura's window she looked up, a mixture of sorrow and determination on her face. Maura didn't turn away, instead she caught Jane's eye, holding her gaze until Jane had to break contact to avoid hurting herself in the maze of traps in the outer courtyard. Just before Maura knew Jane would have to look away she lifted her hand slightly, pressed her fingertips to the glass, a movement almost too subtle to be perceived at such a distance.

Jane broke into a smile unlike any Maura had seen in a long time. She nearly tripped on a board driven through with bent nails and glanced up at her once more, shrugging playfully. Maura smiled softly and watched her until she was out of sight.

She stayed up packing her few things for a few hours, even venturing into the nearly-silent clinic. Two mothers cradled their small children on their laps, pressing damp cloths to their abrasions, quietly trying to get them to swallow pills. Most of the refugees were already in their rooms, trying to sleep. Maura looked at the young women for as long as she could bear, then slipped back out into the hall.

When she got back to her room she found Carrie sitting on the thin sleeping mat she'd dragged from the orphan's room earlier in the day. She was cradling her knees to her chest.

"Hi Carrie," Maura whispered.

"Hi Maura," Carrie whispered back, not lifting her head from her knees.

"Are you all right?"

"I couldn't sleep," she said. "I had bad dreams."

"I have bad dreams too, sometimes," Maura knelt down next to her. "Do you want to talk to me about them?"

Carrie shook her head.

"Do you want me to take you back to your room?"

Carrie shook her head.

"What can I do, sweetheart?" she asked tenderly, brushing Carrie's bangs away from her face.

"Can I sleep in your room?" she asked, her voice very small.

Maura felt her heart tighten in her chest. "Of course," she said. "Come on, I'm awfully sleepy."

"Me too," Carrie yawned. "Where's your friend Jane?"

"I—don't know," she said. "On the outside."

"Is she coming back?"

"I hope so."

"Me too," Carrie said, still yawning. Maura led her into the room and helped her onto the hospital bed. "Your bed is soft," Carrie murmured.

Maura pulled a blanket up over the little girl and brushed her fingers over her cheek. Carrie blinked slowly, her eyelids getting heavier. "Goodnight, Maura," she whispered.

"Goodnight, Carrie," Maura whispered back. She crossed to the window and stood for a few moments, scanning the darkness for signs of Jane and Frost. She sighed and went to a chair, pulling off her boots and dungarees. With one last glance out the window she climbed into the bed, careful not to disturb the already-sleeping Carrie. She tucked the girl against her, pressing her lips to the crown of her head. As she drifted off to sleep she could feel tears pooling on her cheeks.

* * *

It was well after dark by the time Jane and Frost returned, new truck in tow. It had taken them several hours to find one that hadn't been damaged beyond use, but finally they'd found one near Dorchester.

They drove in silence through the scarred landscape. Finally, Frost spoke.

"Look at the stars, Jane."

"Driving here," Jane said.

"Pull over."

"Are you crazy?"

"No, serious, just pull over. Just for a second."

Jane had given him a sidelong glance but pulled the truck to a stop. "Okay."

"Look out your window, Jane," he sighed.

She did. There was no orange-blue city light to obscure the sky, and Jane gasped at the sight of so many stars. She stared at them for a moment, then felt a creeping discomfort begin to gnaw at her. "Can we go?" she asked.

"Yeah," Frost replied. "Sure."

She started driving again. After several wordless miles, she spoke.

"It made me feel too small, you know? Like I don't already feel helpless enough."

Frost didn't respond, but Jane got the feeling he understood.

They'd found a truck near the Dorchester city limits, at the far corner of a mostly-undamaged expanse of parking lot. "I guess it doesn't make sense to drop bombs on something that's gonna be useless anyway," Frost remarked.

"But crawlers, that makes sense?"

"Come on, Jane," Frost said as he popped the lock on the Chevy's drivers-side door. "Don't tell me you believed what Donna said up there."

She shrugged.

They didn't say anything else until Frost managed to coax the engine to roar to life.

"Aw yeah!" he shouted. "We got this!"

"Nice work," Jane grinned, clapping him on the back. You get to drive this one back."

Frost flicked through the cassette tapes scattered on the dusty passenger seat. "The Eagles or The Boss?"

"That's a choice you're going to have to make on your own," Jane said, smiling as she headed back to her own truck.

The drive back had been uneventful, something Jane had sorely missed. She'd pulled up to the hospital at what she figured was around 10 p.m., well after nearly everyone would be asleep. Frost pulled up shortly after, and together they made their way to the gate, flashing three times to let the rooftop sniper know they were safe to enter.

After picking their way through the outer courtyard, Jane clapped Frost on the back again, wished him goodnight, and headed inside. Her room was near the far end of the usable portion of the hospital, one of the smaller exam rooms, but it was her own, and she was grateful for it. On her way, she paused at Maura's door, quietly and carefully pushed it open.

The dull beam of the emergency hall lights, kept on in case children woke in the night, spilled across Maura's face as she slept. Jane gazed at her for a moment before she realized there was another figure in the bed, a small red-haired child.

Her heart leapt into her throat.

_I'm so sorry, Maura_.

Jane slipped into the room as quietly as she could, careful not to wake either sleeper. She stood next to the bed for a moment before leaning down and leaving a soft, brief kiss on Maura's temple.

Maura shifted, sighed, but didn't open her eyes. Jane swallowed hard and quietly backed out of the room.

"Goodnight, Maura," she whispered just before she closed the door.

She realized she wasn't tired, and climbed up to the rooftop. She waved briefly to Gail, who raised her rifle in acknowledgement.

Jane sat down on the crumbling edge of the building and took a deep breath, then leaned back and opened her eyes. The stars glittered brilliantly above her. She'd never experienced anything like it, and their multitudes, their distance, their total disinterest made her feel so small she thought she would disappear. She took another deep breath. Tried to see them as purely beautiful.

It didn't work. Jane was frightened enough already.

She slid off the roof and made her way back to her room, kicking off her boots and flopping down on her bed, staring at the cracked ceiling.

They would leave tomorrow. She didn't know how they would do it, what they would say, but tomorrow, they headed west.

* * *

Hey everybody-thanks again for your time and attention! I'm working super-hard on this story, and trying to update quickly (I think the last three chapters came out 12 hours apart or something crazy), but alas, I have to go back to work again tomorrow, so I'll try to have something for you late! I've got this whole story planned out through the end, so don't you worry!


	7. The River Styx

Maura woke suddenly, early sunlight streaming in the window. She reached over for Carrie, but the bed was empty.

"Carrie?" she called, a note of panic in her voice. She pushed herself awkwardly off the bed, pulling on her trousers, not bothering with her boots. "Carrie?" she called again, opening the door to the hall.

"What?" Carrie said, looking up at her from where she was sitting on her sleeping mat, playing with a broken stethoscope.

"Nothing," Maura said, trying to steady her voice. "Good morning."

"Good morning," Carrie said indifferently, looking back down at her stethoscope.

Maura went back into her room, closed the door. She looked at the small pile of bags and supplies she was taking with her and felt a sudden rush of anguish so powerful she had to sit down.

_I could stay here. With them. I don't know how to do this, I don't know if this new world is one I am ready for._

She hadn't thought about anything other than what she had to do, but she still hadn't come up with any answers. The prospect was too overwhelming. The idea that this was the way life was now, would be from now on, filled her with a despair so great she wasn't sure she even wanted to keep going. The crawlers couldn't scare her into envisioning her own death, but the loss of her humanity, the sense that her humanity had been stolen from her by necessity, by reality, was rushing in to claim that territory.

_I don't think I could keep going if you weren't with me_, Jane had said. But what was there to go toward?

She felt hopeless, she realized; abjectly and utterly, for the first time in her life.

She sighed and started putting on her boots. When thinking got her nowhere, there was always action.

"Dr. Isles?"

She looked up as Diana peeked almost shyly into the room.

"Come in," she said, her voice flat. She couldn't play at positivity any longer, was grateful it was Diana standing at her door so that she didn't have to.

"So," Diana said, standing just inside the room. "Today?"

"Yes."

"Do you . . . have a plan?"

"No," she said, looking into Diana's eyes. "I don't."

"You should tell them right before you leave. The ones you think could make it, I mean," Diana said.

"And the others?"

"Please, Maura—" her first name again—"please let me worry about that."

"I can't," she whispered. "I don't know if I can do this. I don't know if I want to-" she cut herself off.

"Maura," Diana said softly, moving toward her. "_I_ have a plan."

Maura said nothing.

"I'm going to set up a fire wall around the perimeter. We'll need a little more gas than Jane might have been intending to leave. But I think—I don't know, but I_ think_—the crawlers won't be able to get past it. Basically I'm putting all my eggs in this basket, that fire scares them. It might seem stupid, like out of a movie, but it's what I could think of and I have this feeling it will work. At least to keep us safe for a few more days, and maybe they'll move on and we can rebuild and keep going. Maybe we could last long enough to come and find you."

It didn't sound any more ridiculous than the dozens of scenarios Maura had entertained. It sounded like _something_, which was more than she could claim. She thought briefly of the comfort and hope it would bring to the people left behind, to know they were fighting, that they were trying. The way Diana talked about it, Maura found herself believing it could work. Wanting to believe it would work. Hoping.

"You're very brave," she whispered.

"I don't know if I can do this," Diana smiled wryly, "but if I can't, well, I'm not sure this is a world I want to live in, either."

"I didn't mean-"

"I know," Diana said. "But we've all thought it. This is what life is going to be like from now on, until the end of our lives. Everything is broken. Everything we knew is gone. I used to think I was strong enough, I used to think that because I'd seen combat I could see anything. But everything is combat now. When I was overseas I always knew I was going to come back home. If I didn't die over there, I mean," she shrugged. "But there's no home to come back to any more. And I'm not as strong as I thought."

"Diana," Maura breathed. Diana shook her head.

"I'm not, Maura, and I accept it. But you are. This is a terrible position for you to be in. I can't imagine what it must be like. For me it's easier, I think. I'm going to save these people or die trying." She held up her hand to stop Maura's protest. "But you have to go out there, you have to leave, you have to find something . . . _more_. You have to find hope, and that's what's giving me strength right now. Knowing someone is at least trying."

Maura felt tears welling in her eyes again. She reached up to brush them away and Diana caught her hand.

"Please don't cry," she whispered. "I hate it when you cry."

"I'm sorry," she said, a tear slipping down her cheek.

Diana took a deep breath. She leaned forward and kissed Maura suddenly, gently, sweetly.

Maura gasped but didn't pull away.

_Intimacy is a balm._

Diana broke the kiss, looking away, blushing deeply. "I'm sorry," she mumbled.

"Please don't be sorry," Maura said quickly. "Please."

"Consider it the last request of a dying soldier," Diana said, a sad smile playing at the corners of her mouth. She gave Maura a long look and turned to leave.

"Diana, wait." The woman paused but didn't turn around. Maura reached out and took her hand, physically turning her. She didn't speak for a moment, simply looked at her. "You'll come and find us," she said finally. "We'll be waiting for you in a safe place. All right?"

Diana smiled ruefully. She nodded. "All right" she said. "Maura-"

"Yes?"

"Take care of yourself. If you can't-" She paused. "If you can't, at least let Jane do it for you."

"I will," she whispered.

"Promise me, Maura."

"I promise."

Diana squeezed her hand briefly, smiled in the way that had always managed to lift Maura's spirits.

This time it filled her with so much sorrow she thought she would drown in it.

* * *

Jane had woken well before dawn. She'd spent the earliest hours quietly carting supplies to the two trucks she and Frost had managed to find, feeling a thin rush of self-hatred when she weighed the value of boxes of bullets against how many people they'd need to accommodate.

_How many would it be convenient for you to take?_

Maura's words had cut deeply, but Jane recognized the knife as her own. She couldn't help her frustration, couldn't make herself actually want to take strangers in place of supplies, but she knew Maura was right. _Don't lose sight, Jane_, she told herself. _They want life as much as you do_.

Still, she had sighed as she eyed the bed of the truck and set one of her gas cans aside.

When the sun rose she was nearly done. All that remained were Maura's things and the survivors they'd be taking with them. Jane glanced around the courtyard, still silent, blue shadows still settled over everything. It looked almost peaceful. If it hadn't been for the shattered concrete, the blasted tile, the crumbling walls, the three pistols she carried, she might have felt almost at peace in the total quiet of the early dawn.

The first sign of life she noticed was Diana, striding across the inner courtyard toward her.

Jane swallowed hard.

"Jane," Diana called. "Can I talk to you?"

"Yeah," she said uncertainly. "Sure, okay."

"I have a plan," Diana said without prelude. "I need gasoline."

"There's some surplus in the annex," Jane said. "What are you going to do?"

"Burn them."

"Diana!" Jane gasped, took a step back.

"The crawlers, Jane!" Diana cried. "Oh God, did you think I meant—"

"I'm sorry," Jane said hastily. "No. Please. God, don't think I'd-"

"It's okay," Diana cut her off. "In the annex?"

"Yeah. There should be enough to power the generators for a few days with careful rationing. And take this one," she said, picking up the can that wouldn't fit in the truck. "There should be forty or fifty gallons, all told."

"That should do it." Diana hefted the five-gallon can. "When do you think you'll go?"

"As soon as we can, I guess," Jane said, suddenly deeply uncomfortable. She hadn't given much real thought to the choice Diana was making, had shied away from contemplating that kind of sacrifice. She felt selfish, childish, unworthy next to her. She kicked at the dirt, rubbed the back of her neck. "As soon as we get everyone."

"I told Dr. Isles to wait until the last moment before rounding people up," Diana said. "So their choice is easier, even though it's less fair."

"Thanks," Jane muttered. Even here, even now, hearing Diana say Maura's name made something sharp and ugly twist in her, even though she recognized the knife as her own.

"Take care of her," Diana said after a pause, giving her a strange look. "Please."

"I will," Jane replied automatically.

"I know you will. But . . ." she drifted off.

"What?"

"Nothing." Diana shook her head, lifted the gas can. "Good luck, Jane."

"You too, Diana."

There was nothing more to say.

Jane watched Diana haul the gas can across the courtyard toward the annex, pausing just slightly as Maura emerged from the hospital doors, her arms full of boxes, her pack and rifle slung around her shoulders. She looked down, walked faster. Maura glanced only fleetingly at Diana's retreating form, then cast her eyes toward the ground as well. Jane frowned.

Maura didn't acknowledge Jane until she was nearly to the truck. "This is all I've got," she said, handing over her armload of boxes. "Bandages, alcohol, a few painkillers, some antibiotics. It's not much."

"It's great, Maura," Jane said softly. "It will be enough."

Maura still didn't look at her, instead threw her pack inside the cab of the truck. "I'm riding with you?" Her tone half a question.

"Yeah, of course," Jane said. "I mean," she went on, "if you want to."

She finally glanced up at Jane and Jane could see she'd been crying. She thought briefly of Diana crossing the courtyard, looking away when she saw Maura.

"Yes," Maura answered quietly. "I want to."

Jane couldn't suppress her awkward grin. "Frost will drive the other truck. He decided on Bruce Springsteen," she grimaced. "So we get The Eagles. At least it's a best-of."

Maura offered a watery smile and Jane felt the faintest breath of relief pass through her.

"When do we leave?" Maura asked, her voice a study in detachment.

"Uh, as soon as we can, I guess," Jane said. "I'm all ready here. I haven't seen Frost yet, but he never likes to wake up early."

Maura looked at her curiously.

"Stakeouts," Jane shrugged.

"Mm-hmm," she said, slipping her rifle off her shoulder and placing it on the dash.

Jane allowed herself to admire for a fleeting moment the way Maura handled her weapon. She hadn't imagined a woman like Maura would take so naturally to a gun, though she realized with an internal crooked grin that she really didn't know what a woman like Maura was really like. _Let's live through this day_ she thought, shaking her head, _then think about it_.

"Jane!" Frost half-shouted from across the courtyard.

"Keep it down!" she hissed. Their plan was still a secret from everyone in the camp except Diana, and not even Frost knew that she was aware of what they were planning.

"What's that nurse doing in the annex?" Frost asked when he reached them. "Looked like she was checking out the gas cans."

"It's fine, don't worry about it." Jane deliberately avoided the look she knew Maura was giving her.

"Okay," Frost shrugged, "if you say so."

"I do. Did you get all your stuff together?"

"Yeah," Frost said, raising his pack. "Everything else is here already."

"Okay," Jane said, taking a steadying breath. "I guess it's time to start-"

She stopped.

"Jane?" Maura asked.

"Look," Jane whispered hoarsely, pointing to the sky.

Maura and Frost turned and looked in the direction Jane was pointing.

"What's that?" Frost asked, shielding his eyes.

"Planes," Jane said, an icy fear washing over her.

"What—I didn't think—oh Jane, do you think they're coming to rescue us?" Maura's eyes were wide as saucers.

"I don't think so," Jane said, slowly backing over to the drivers' side door of her truck. "Maura, get in. Frost, you too."

"Mine, or-"

"It doesn't matter, Frost, just _get in something_," Jane shouted, swinging herself into the cab. Maura didn't question, simply followed Jane's directive. Jane turned the key and said a silent prayer of thanks when the engine roared to life.

"Jane-"

"Change of plans," Jane said, squealing out of the courtyard, the tires leaving long black lines down the cracked tiles.

"Jane, what's-"

Maura didn't have time to finish her sentence before the first building exploded in a deafening roar behind them.

"Jane!" she cried, ducking down.

"It's okay, Maura," Jane said through gritted teeth, glancing in the rearview. "Don't watch."

"What's going on?" Maura whimpered. "Jane, what's going _on_?"

"I'm not sure," Jane said as another explosion caused the truck to pitch and heave. Jane was driving as fast as the road would allow, Frost on her tail.

"Jane," Maura said again, pleading.

"Maura, please," Jane swerved to avoid a fire hydrant blocking the right lane. "I'm not sure what's—"

A series of explosions behind them. Fire blooming in the rearview mirror.

"Oh God," Maura whispered.

Jane suddenly jerked the steering wheel and veered off the street, bringing the truck to a lurching halt next to a massive pile of rubble.

"What are you doing?" Maura gasped.

"I don't want them to see us."

"_Who?"_

_Government, I guess_.

"I think Donna was right," Jane muttered as the planes soared overhead. "I don't think anyone was supposed to survive."

"But Jane, all those people, all those children-" her voice choked off. Jane knew she was thinking of the little girl, Carrie. Of Diana.

"It was fast, Maura," she said. It was the only thing she could think to say. "They were asleep."

Maura didn't say anything. Her face was drawn, deathly pale, her eyes bright and huge. The planes of her cheeks stood out in sharp relief.

"Maura, we're going to make it."

Nothing.

"Maura, please."

Nothing.

"Maura-"

"I can't, Jane," she said, her voice emptier than Jane had ever heard it. "I can't."

They sat there in silence, separated by Maura's rifle and a small stockpile of cartridges, for what felt like hours, until Jane was sure the last of the planes had passed overhead. She wanted so badly to touch Maura, to take her hands, to hold her tightly, but the old fear clung to her, it followed at her heels even into the depths of hell. Something about getting too close.

Finally Jane put the key back in the ignition and started the truck. She heard the accompanying roar of Frost's rig, parked a dozen or so yards behind them. She glanced once more at Maura, whose face had not changed, who still stared straight ahead, her eyes shimmering and blank as diamonds.

Jane bit her lip and pulled back onto the road that would lead them out of Boston. She didn't spare a glance for the still-burning hospital, instead stared straight ahead, her eyes dark and deep as wells.

* * *

Okay well I hope this was all right, you guys. Oh man, this one made me nervous.


	8. The River Lethe

They drove in silence until Jane had managed to navigate their way out of the city. The sun had begun its descent by the time they reached the western curve of the Charles, though it still hung blazing in the sky as Jane stopped the truck to curse the the vacant place where a bridge had once spanned the river.

"Fuck," she muttered, slamming her hand on the hood of the vehicle. In the cab, Maura didn't even seem to notice, simply stared out her window, lost in thought. Jane hadn't tried to speak to her, but hadn't been able to stop glancing at her as they made their way past the unending devastation.

It seemed as though nothing had been spared, that the destruction was even more widespread that Jane had even thought to imagine. The roads were lined with cratered foundations, enormous chunks of rubble littering the cracked asphalt. More than once she'd had to stop and turn around, finding her way blocked by a downed utility pole, a flipped car, some nameless piece of twisted metal or shattered stone.

_Everything is gone_, she thought. _Everything_.

She'd held on to a sliver of hope that once they got out of Boston they'd find something resembling the life they'd known before the darkness had come. She hadn't been able to consider the idea that the terror and chaos would be so total, so final. They hadn't had any news of the world outside their enclave since the incident, but, Jane had thought, _surely this can't be all there is now._ Surely the entirety of the world she knew couldn't mirror what had happened in the city, but with each passing mile she felt more and more certain that what had happened was much larger than she had imagined.

_But those planes. Someone is still alive. Something is still working. Even if who and what means more death, more destruction. _

She shivered as she thought about the planes, their high reedy drone, the almost inaudible whistle as they dropped their payloads on the defenseless hospital.

_It happened fast. They were all asleep_.

Jane shook her head. She couldn't think about it any more. She didn't have the luxury of mourning. _Besides_, she thought, looking into the cab of the truck at Maura's expressionless face, _she's mourning enough for both of us._

Frost pulled up next to Jane, got out of his truck.

"Well," he said.

"Yeah."

"What do you think?"

Jane grimaced, squinting into the sun. "There should be another bridge a few miles south of here. But who knows if it's still standing."

"They probably took out all the bridges right away."

"You starting to think like I am, Frost?"

"I guess so. I mean, those planes."

"Yeah."

They didn't say anything for a long minute, simply regarded the Charles as it rippled by, smooth as glass.

"You okay?" Frost asked finally, looking straight ahead.

"Yeah," Jane said with a bitter laugh. "Sure. You?"

"Sure."

Jane could tell he wanted to ask about Maura, and was quietly grateful he didn't. She wouldn't know what to say.

"How's the Boss?"

"Still born in the USA," Frost said, shrugging.

"I could really go for a beer right now," Jane sighed, locking her fingers behind her head. "You know?"

"Yeah," Frost said. "I know."

They stood looking at the river for a few moments more before Jane sighed again and turned back to her truck. "I guess we should check out the other bridge," she said, speaking to Frost but her eyes locked on Maura, who still stared mutely out the window.

"All right." Frost moved back toward his truck, paused, turned to her. "Jane," he said softly, "you should talk to her."

Jane winced. "I don't know what to say," she mumbled.

"You don't have to say anything in particular," Frost said, his voice kind. "You just have to say _something_. She needs you right now, Jane, and I don't think I'd be wrong if I said she needs you more than she ever has. I'd say_ I_ need you more than I ever have," he smiled, "but it's not like that with us."

"It's not like that with-" Jane started, but Frost threw her a skeptical glance.

"Jane," he sighed. "Do you honestly think there's any reason left to keep that up?" He shook his head and climbed back into his rig. "Bridge should be about three miles south-southwest of here if I'm thinking about the same one you are. Small, right? Maybe they missed it. Race you there," he said, Bruce Springsteen's earnest rasp suddenly cutting through the late-afternoon silence.

Jane stood next to her own vehicle for a moment, mouth open, as Frost sped away, swooping elaborately around chunks of broken masonry and tree limbs.

"I'm not keeping anything up," she muttered under her breath. She looked at Maura again, heard the echo of her own words, heard how hollow they were.

_Live through this day. Then think about it. Maybe_.

Jane took a breath and opened the door, sliding into her seat as quietly as she could. She felt distinctly the pressure not to disturb Maura, to be as unobtrusive as was possible in such a confined space. She didn't know how to handle the depths of Maura's grief. She didn't know how to not make it worse.

"We think there's a bridge a few miles south of here that might still be standing," she said as neutrally as she could. Maura didn't respond. "If that's true," she plowed on, "we should be out of any metropolitan area by nightfall. I don't know if that'll be safer or more dangerous, but I don't think it's a good idea to stop moving until we have to." Maura didn't give any indication that she'd heard her.

"Maura," she said, her voice suddenly inflected with more shades of meaning than even she could understand. "Maura, please."

Nothing.

Jane bit her lip, turned the key, steered the truck back onto the road.

_Take care of her, Jane_.

_I will_.

She looked at Maura again, afraid that if she stopped looking Maura would vanish, ghostlike, into a world made of a sorrow so total Jane was afraid she wouldn't be able to save her. She hadn't been able to save anyone else.

* * *

_Stay with me. I'll keep you safe_.

The words repeated endlessly in Maura's mind, the image of Carrie looking up at her, eyes wide with fear, as Maura shot at the encroaching crawlers through the hospital window. The promise she'd made.

The feeling of Carrie's tiny body pressed to her own, her soft breath on Maura's skin as she shifted in the night.

The surprisingly sweet pressure of Diana's lips against her own.

_Stay with me. I'll keep you safe_.

She didn't register the blasted skyline as it drifted past her window. She didn't register anything except the overwhelming despair of having failed everyone who had depended on her. The promises she'd made.

The echo of the blasts that destroyed the hospital still rang in her ears, the impossibly bright flashes in the rearview mirror still burned on her brain. She had escaped, she had lived, but she couldn't understand why.

"Maura?"

She heard Jane's voice, vaguely, like the rustle of leaves in the wind.

"Maura, please."

She couldn't pull herself up from the depths of her sorrow to answer Jane, even though a part of her knew Jane was all she had left; a part of her knew Jane was all she really needed to keep going.

_I couldn't keep going if you weren't with me_.

Maura wanted so desperately for Jane to understand, to see, to know how much she needed her, to know how much she depended on her, cared for her. She was so afraid that if Jane knew she would lose her. She was so afraid that one more loss, that loss, would be more than she could bear.

They had been driving for hours, it seemed, yet hadn't managed to cross the river. The bridge had been destroyed. Everything had been destroyed, yet they kept moving. Maura knew in the back of her mind that there was no choice but to keep moving, that the sacrifices that had been made by Diana and the others meant she had to continue despite the crushing guilt.

Gradually the fires receded from her consciousness, replaced by the rumble of the truck's engine, the sharp edge of a cartridge box digging into her side. She realized she was extraordinarily thirsty.

"Jane," she said softly, still not looking away from the window. She could see Jane glance at her out of the corner of her eye.

"Yeah?"

"Is there any water?"

"Yeah," Jane said, her voice soft, careful. "There's some under the seat, do you want me to get it for you?"

"You're driving," Maura said. "That would hardly be prudent."

"I'll pull over."

Maura smiled despite everything. "I can get it," she said. "You need to focus. You're a terrible driver when you're not paying attention."

"I'm a terrible driver when I _am_ paying attention," Jane grinned.

"You'll get no argument from me."

Maura reached under the seat and found a bottle of water, the label torn but the cap still sealed. She drank deeply.

"Would you like some?" she asked, finally turning to look at Jane, holding out the bottle. Jane turned to her. Maura could see she was trying to suppress a smile, and she supposed Jane didn't want to look too happy after all that had occurred. "It's all right," she said softly. "I'm here, I promise."

Jane grinned more broadly than Maura could remember her doing since before the darkness came. "Look out!" she cried as they nearly rear-ended Frost, who had stopped at the edge of the road. Jane slammed on the breaks, fishtailing slightly, her arm flying out to press Maura against the seat.

"Sorry," she muttered. "I guess you're right about paying attention, huh."

"Let's not survive just to die in a car accident with the only other car we've seen in a month, all right?"

"All right," Jane smiled. She paused, then took Maura's hand, squeezing it lightly. "I'm glad you're here."

"I am too," she said, though her eyes darkened momentarily. Jane gazed at her for a long beat, until Frost rapped on the window, causing them both to jump. Jane wrenched handle. "Stupid manual windows," she grumbled. "Couldn't we at least have found something made after I was born?" She looked at Frost expectantly. "What's the word?"

"Bridge looks to be passable, though it's got a big chunk out about halfway across. If we're careful, I think we can make it."

"What other choice do we have?" Jane said, her tone exaggeratedly upbeat. "Let's do it!"

"Hi Maura," Frost said.

"Hello, Detective Frost," Maura said, smiling softly at him. "I'm glad to see you."

* * *

The sky had turned a deep purple by the time they were safely across the bridge. The landscape had shifted from blighted civilization to gently sloping woodlands, almost eerily calm. The trees had kept the majority of their leaves during the unusually long summer, though even in the growing darkness Maura could see they had shifted from emerald to brilliant scarlet, to soft gold. She had always loved watching the leaves change, and seeing it now, something so beautiful after so much horror, made her breath catch in her throat.

"I think we'll be okay if we pull off somewhere for the night," Jane said. "We'll have to keep watch. I'll take the first one, if you want."

"I don't think I could sleep, Jane," Maura said. "Right now I don't know if I'll ever sleep again."

"I know the feeling," Jane murmured. "I feel like I haven't slept in years." She pulled up and around, matching Frost's speed, indicating he should roll his window down. "We're gonna pull over soon," she shouted. "Stop if you see a place that looks good."

"How about that?" Frost shouted back, pointing at a nearby house that seemed to be undamaged.

"Yeah," Jane called, "why the hell not? Maybe they left some beer."

"Maybe there's someone in there, Jane," Maura said softly, not knowing if she was hopeful or frightened. "We don't know how far whatever this is has spread."

"I'd say pretty far," Jane replied, "no power, no cars, no people yet. I'll go in first, you stay here in the truck."

"I can defend myself, Jane," Maura said, a bit cross. "And we don't know what's out there, we don't know if there are crawlers here, we don't know anything."

"That's why you're staying in the car."

"Jane!" Maura cried. "That's not—"

"I'll have Frost with me," Jane said.

"So you're just leaving me alone, in the car, in the dark, while you and Frost go knock on a strange door in the middle of Western Mass."

Jane thought for a moment. "Yeah, basically. No, that's a terrible idea. Okay, you can come, but you have to stay back."

Maura sighed. "I don't mean to offend your pride, but I'm a better shot than you are by now."

"Consider my pride mortally offended, Dr. Isles."

"Well, that's one less thing to have to consider, I suppose."

Jane smiled. She steered the truck up the rutted track, cutting the engine a dozen yards from the house. Frost pulled up behind them, met them at the driver's side door.

"What's the plan?"

"You got a flashlight?"

He held it up.

"Okay. We're gonna check the perimeter. Maura, you stay back, keep your weapon up just in case." Maura nodded, reaching for her rifle. "If it looks clear, we'll knock. If nobody answers, we'll go in."

They all glanced at each other, their faces barely visible in the rapidly-fading light.

"All right," Jane said. "Let's go."

She and Frost crept up to the house, weapons drawn, flashlights at their sides. Maura raised her rifle, listening intently to the soft whisper of the wind through the trees. She realized she was chilly, something she hadn't felt in months. The summer was coming to an end.

She heard Frost and Jane speaking quietly to each other as they moved around the building, but couldn't make out what they were saying. She kept her rifle trained on the house.

_If it moves, shoot it_.

"Clear," Jane called softly as they came back around the other side. "We're going in."

She and Frost crept carefully up the steps to the porch, took opposite sides of the front door. Jane knocked once, twice, paused.

Nothing.

She knocked again.

Nothing.

Maura watched as Jane and Frost exchanged glances. She watched as Jane looked briefly over at her, offering a faint smile.

She smiled back, faintly, trying to control her breathing.

Jane twisted the knob, and the door swung open. Maura heard her call out, waited for a response.

Nothing.

She saw the beams of the flashlights, suddenly brilliant against the total darkness that had washed over everything. After an agonizing few minutes, Jane emerged and headed toward the truck.

"Looks clear," she said. "Safer than sleeping in the trucks. Plus there's blankets!"

They pulled their packs out of the cab. Jane reached into Frost's truck and grabbed his knapsack, and they headed toward the house. Maura didn't lower her rifle until they were inside.

"This feels so weird, Jane," she whispered. She couldn't see much of the interior of the house, but it appeared to be tidy, as though the owners had just stepped out for a moment, but there was the unmistakable pall of tragedy, the one that had clung to everything since everything changed.

"Yeah," Jane whispered, "I know. But everything feels kinda weird, huh?"

"That's an understatement if I ever heard one."

"All right," Frost said, emerging from a room near the back of the house. "Water doesn't work. No electricity. Two bedrooms, both with southern exposure. There's some bookcases we can move against the windows, just in case."

"Dibs on the one with the down pillows," Jane said.

"There's down pillows?" Maura frowned. "How do you know?"

"I don't. But if they are, they're mine. What do you say, team, should we sleep in real beds?"

"It's the small things," Maura murmured.

"I'll take the guest room," Frost said. "The other one's got the . . . ahh . . ."

"Bigger bed?" Jane asked, raising her eyebrow even though Frost couldn't see it.

"Yeah."

"How generous of you, Detective." Jane lifted her pack off the ground and moved to the bedroom. "Come on, Maura, I bet you'll be asleep in a minute flat."

"I bet you'll be asleep before you can collect on that," Maura said, smiling though Jane couldn't see it.

"In the morning we'll take a look around, regroup, see if this is a good place to sit tight for a couple of days until we figure out what to do next. Maybe we can find some supplies, some food." Jane went into the bedroom, promptly running into a small bedside table. "Damn it!"

"Be careful, Jane," Maura said. "We didn't come all this way to lose you to a nightstand."

Even though she'd meant it as a joke, the words resonated deeply. _I didn't come all this way to lose you, Jane. Not to anything_.

She lifted her own pack and slung her rifle over her shoulder. "Goodnight, Detective Frost," she called.

"Goodnight, Dr. Isles," he called back.

"You two are so weird," Jane muttered. "You know he's got a first name, right?"

"We enjoy the mutual respect we have for each others' chosen field," Maura said.

"So what does that make me, then? Chopped liver?"

"If it did, I'd refer to you as such. Now, please close the door. We may be fighting our way through an apocalypse but that doesn't mean I want Detective Frost to see me changing."

"I wouldn't mind, though," he called through his bedroom door."

"Goodnight, Detective," Jane groaned, as she pushed the door shut.

* * *

I feel like everybody deserved a quiet chapter after that last one, and before the next one. Thank you for your love and attention, e'erbody! If you have any questions about this story that you're dying to ask _and get an answer to_,* please make sure you're either logged in to your account so I can PM you or ask me on Tumblr (domini-porter). I'm beyond delighted to talk to any and all of you!

*unless the question is "are you going to finish this" because please let me assure you right now, YES I TOTALLY AM.


	9. Drive

Jane heard the faint call of birds.

She felt a vague confusion, unable to place the sound for a moment, then groggily realized she hadn't heard birdsong in weeks. She smiled faintly, still mostly asleep, letting the sound seep into her consciousness. She shifted slightly, allowing herself the luxury of not leaping out of bed, preparing for another day of fighting, of searching, of struggling, though she knew those things would still happen. This morning she allowed herself the luxury of knowing those things would still happen whether or not she spent a little longer in the warm softness of a real bed.

She sighed almost happily, not opening her eyes, and burrowed more deeply beneath the blankets, closer to Maura, who was still—

Jane's eyes flew open.

She realized she was pressed tightly against Maura's body, her face nestled at the back of Maura's neck, her arm slung around Maura's waist. Her breath caught and she felt her heart begin to pound as she debated whether or not she should try to pull away, weighing the possibility of waking Maura against the possibility of pretending she hadn't been holding her all night. Jane moved her arm, at least she could stop cradling her, at least she could just be laying next to her, at least that—

Maura murmured softly in her sleep, shifted, caught Jane's hand, laced Jane's fingers through hers, pulled Jane's arm up so that she was clasping Maura tightly, their arms entwined. Maura sighed, pressed herself against Jane.

Jane was wide awake.

She lay as still as she could, her breathing so shallow she feared for a moment she'd pass out, her pulse thrumming so loudly in her ears it drowned out the birds, Maura's drowsy breathing, it drowned out her own thoughts.

All Jane was conscious of in that moment was the soft rise and fall of Maura's body as she breathed, the warmth of her, the pressure of her hand holding Jane's. She was surprised by how soft Maura's skin was despite their weeks of hardship, and felt embarrassed about her own callused fingers, rough from work.

_She's sleeping, she can't tell. She probably doesn't even know she's doing it. _

Jane felt a brief flash of regret at the idea that Maura had unconsciously reached for her, that she would probably feel embarrassed or awkward when she woke up. Jane resolved to disentangle herself as carefully as possible, without disturbing her. _To spare us both._

She flexed her fingers gently, working to loosen Maura's grip, while she slowly tried to slip her arm out from under Maura's.

"Don't," Maura mumbled.

Jane froze.

Maura didn't speak again, didn't move. Her breath remained steady. Jane could feel the pulse in Maura's neck, was almost pressing her lips to the spot, yet somehow Maura's heartbeat remained slow and calm.

"Okay," Jane breathed. She slipped her fingers back through Maura's, allowed her hand to rest on the ridge of Maura's collarbone. She waited for Maura to speak again, to acknowledge her, but she said nothing, simply curled her knees up slightly, her back curving into Jane.

Jane frowned, bit her lip. She wanted to take a deep breath but she was worried Maura would notice, would wake up.

She realized she was worried Maura would let go of her hand. Jane closed her eyes, said a silent prayer, curled her own legs up under Maura's, pulled Maura a little closer to her.

Maura murmured again, wordlessly.

Jane took a moment to work at breathing normally, at controlling her heartbeat. Maura still appeared to be asleep, or close enough, and Jane realized the last thing she wanted to do was disturb her until it was absolutely necessary. She didn't have any idea how well or poorly Maura had been sleeping, but if Maura was anything like her this was the first time in a long time she had slept past the first moments of dawn.

The sunlight was creeping across the floor but Jane felt herself being lulled back into soft slumber as she held Maura, as she let the rhythm of Maura's breathing guide her own. She nuzzled Maura's neck just slightly, tentatively, unsure of whether or not she should.

"Mm-hmm," Maura murmured, and all Jane's work to regulate herself evaporated. Her heart thudded almost painfully in her chest and she was worried for a brief moment that the pulse would be strong enough for Maura to notice.

Jane realized she wanted to be there, holding Maura, for as long as she possibly could.

The birds grew louder as the morning light filtered into the room. Jane was nearly asleep again, a faint smile on her face, when a sudden pounding on the door jerked her back into consciousness.

"Jane!" Frost shouted. "Jane, get up, we've got a problem!"

Jane leapt out of bed, a fleeting regret passing through her as she released Maura, who sat up, eyes wide.

"What is it, Frost?" Jane called, grabbing for her boots.

"Movement in the woods, eastern edge of the clearing!"

"Coming," she said. "Maura, stay here, okay?"

"I'm not staying here, Jane!" Maura cried. "We've already had this conversation."

"Then get your boots on and grab your gun." Maura slipped out of the bed and Jane couldn't help staring for a moment at her bare legs, the curve of her hip as she leaned over for her trousers. _Not the time, Jane_, she chastised herself.

She waited until Maura had gotten dressed before opening the door and seeing Frost standing on the other side, checking the clip of the revolver he wore under his arm. "What do you think?"

"Slow. Could be an animal. Haven't seen it, just heard a branch break and saw the brush moving."

"Yeah, well, let's hope it's Bambi and not crawlers."

"I always figured you'd be the one who said the hunter got a bad rap."

"A man's gotta eat, Frost," Jane said, checking her own clips. "How was he supposed to know that deer's kid would grow up to be a movie star?" She shoved the clip back into place, relishing as always the oiled _click_ as it engaged. Maura emerged from the bedroom, rifle in hand.

"Sorry to wake you like this, Doc," Frost smiled apologetically. "I was sleeping pretty soundly myself, until I heard that branch."

"Please," Maura murmured, and Jane could swear she was trying to suppress a blush. "This is hardly the time for apologies."

"All right," Jane said, and by the look Frost gave her she realized she's spoken a bit too loudly. "All right," she said again, softer. "Let's go kill something."

Maura winced. Jane grimaced. "I mean," she said, "if it's bad."

Maura smiled softly, shook her head. She glanced down at her rifle, her eyes narrowing with focus as she checked the sight and flicked the safety off. Jane caught herself staring. Again. _What did I just say_, she scolded herself, again.

Maura looked up at her and nodded. Jane glanced at Frost, and they headed for the front door. "West side of the house," Jane hissed as they moved quietly off the porch. "Maura, I need you to find a safe place that you can shoot from, you'll be giving me and Frost cover. Remember—"

"—if it moves, shoot it. I remember." Maura glanced around, noticed a burn barrel standing in a patch of dirt a few yards from the house. "There," she whispered, pointing. Jane nodded.

"I'll cover you, go, fast!"

Maura waited the half-second until Jane had her revolver out before darting across the overgrown lawn and crouching behind the barrel. The sun beat down on her already, though it felt thinner, less overwhelming than it had been. _Summer is ending_.

She focused her sight on the stand of trees just past where the land had been cleared for the house. She saw a hint of movement, the pale underside of leaves flashing as something moved slowly through them, and her heart froze. She took a deep breath, focused herself through the rifle, narrowed her attention to the tiny circle of the world she could pinpoint in the crosshairs.

Jane and Frost kept down, creeping toward the trees from an oblique angle, moving as silently as they could. The foliage rustled again, nearer the edge of the greenbelt, and they dropped low, weapons pointed toward the movement.

Suddenly—

"Crawlers!" Jane shouted, opening fire as a mottled shape came lumbering out of the trees, its stumbling gait amplified by the fact that one of its legs had been torn nearly off and was thumping uselessly along after the bulk of its bloated body. It didn't get more than a couple of feet past the treeline before a bullet exploded what remained of its head, and it dropped to the ground with a sickening splat.

"Was that you," Jane panted, "or me?"

"You can have that one," Frost breathed, "but this one's mine." He fired off two rapid shots, dropping a second crawler as it moved clumsily out of the shadows.

The echo of the gunshots faded. Nobody moved.

"There can't just be two of them. There's never just two of them." Jane felt for the gun at her hip, cursing when she realized it was still in the house, along with her M16. "Well," she said ruefully, "let's hope there's less than twenty."

"What makes you think you get 'em all?" Frost said, mock-affronted. "I've got bullets too, you know."

"Yeah, well—"

"Get down!" Maura cried, half a second before Jane felt a bullet go whizzing by, inches from her cheek. There was a heavy thump as a crawler hit the ground.

"You gotta give a little more warning than that, Maura," Jane called weakly.

"_You've_got to pay a little more attention, Jane," Maura called back. "Like right now, for instance."

Jane looked up and saw a dozen crawlers, maybe more, making their way slowly toward them. She fired as quickly as she could, unable to discern which shots were hers and which were Frost's. She thought she heard the loud pop of Maura's rifle, but she couldn't tell.

"We gotta go," she shouted. "We gotta get out of here." She reached briefly down, letting out a sharp breath of relief as she felt the keys in her pocket. "Maura, cover us! Frost, fall back around the house!"

They stumbled backward, still shooting, until they made it around the corner, pressing against the west side of the building. "Maura, run, I've got you!" Maura nodded, getting off two more quick shots before darting back across the yard to meet them. "Truck!" Jane barked. "Now!"

"I don't have the keys, they're in the house," Frost said.

"Looks like you're riding with us."

"Our supplies, Jane—" Maura said, her voice tight.

"Well, we just gotta hope we stumble across a Target." She laughed harshly.

"Yeah, nice," Frost grimaced. "Very funny."

"Ready?" Jane said, keeping her weapon raised. Maura and Frost nodded. "Okay, go! Now!"

They ran for Jane's truck as fast as they could. Jane couldn't help but glance toward the woods, her stomach clenching at the sight of dozens of shapes moving among the trees. _At least they're slow_, she thought, wrenching the driver's side door open and throwing herself into the seat. Maura slid in next to her, Frost just behind. Jane jammed the key into the ignition, saying the same silent prayer she always did when she needed to make a quick escape, exhaling slowly as the engine turned over. She slammed the truck into gear and roared back down the rutted driveway as fast as she could.

Maura shifted and looked behind them as they sped away. "There's hundreds of them, Jane," she breathed. "Where did they all come from?"

"I don't know," Jane said, glancing in the rearview mirror. "But let's not stick around and ask them, yeah?"

Maura rolled her eyes. Jane grinned.

"You guys okay?"

"I'm fine," Maura said. "Just a little shaken."

"Yeah, I'm all right." Frost looked back at the house. "Sad to lose my Beretta, though. I always like that one."

"I'll get you a thousand Berettas if we make it out of here," Jane said, wrenching the truck into third gear. The engine roared as they sped down the deserted road, trees running together in a blur through the windows.

After several minutes of pushing the engine to the brink, Jane eased off the gas and allowed the truck to slow down. She noticed that her leg hurt, and realized Maura had been clutching her thigh so hard Jane was sure if she hadn't been wearing sturdy trousers she would've drawn blood.

"Uh," she said, shifting the leg slightly.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Maura mumbled, releasing her. She looked slightly abashed. Jane didn't even look at Frost to see his reaction, though she suspected it fell somewhere between amusement and the sort of knowing superiority she would cold-clock anyone else for.

"Okay," Jane said with forced brightness. "What now?"

"You're the boss," Frost said, shrugging.

"Don't you ever forget you said that, Frost. I won't."

"Isn't there a town around here?" Maura asked. "I think I had to come out here once to assist an ME with some insect analysis."

"Gross," Jane said, sneering in disgust.

"Jane," Maura said patiently, "you just shot the heads off a dozen . . . _things_ back there. But you're afraid of a little larvae?"

"I'm not _afraid_ of it," Jane protested. "It's just _gross_."

"Yet you're totally fine with exploding viscera."

"Ladies," Frost said quietly, "if you don't mind."

"Sorry," Jane snickered. "How are you still bothered by this stuff, Frost?"

He shrugged.

"You should be more sensitive, Jane," Maura chided. "Detective Frost is incredibly brave and has done nothing but help protect you as you've protected him."

"Thank you, Doctor," he said, nodding courteously to her.

"You guys are so weird," Jane muttered again. "Maura," she said, "will you hand me that water bottle? My mouth tastes like gunpowder."

Maura leaned down and fished under the seat, murmuring her apologies as she leaned into Frost. Frost glanced at Jane, smiling knowingly.

"You shut up," Jane grumbled.

"What did I say?" Maura asked, concerned, as she retrieved the bottle.

"Nothing," Frost and Jane said in unison. Maura frowned at each of them, handed the water to Jane.

"Do you want me to open it?" she asked, and Frost nodded approvingly at Jane while Maura was turned away from him.

"Frost!" Jane shouted. "I swear to God."

"Do you two need to be separated? Jane, do you need to ride in the back?"

"Why do I have to ride in the back? I didn't even do anything!"

"I have a hard time believing that."

"Yeah, Jane," Frost said. "Be nice."

"I'm always nice," she muttered. "But _you_—"

"Jane!" Maura cried suddenly. "The road—"

There was a sickening crunch as the front end of the truck collided with a concrete barrier laying half across the asphalt. The truck spun wildly, finally slamming into a tree and shuddering to a halt.

Steam billowed from the crumpled hood. Maura blinked groggily, her arm sore from when she'd thrown it against the dash to brace herself, though otherwise she seemed to be unhurt. "Jane?" she mumbled. "Detective Frost? Are you all right?"

"I'm all right, I think," Frost said.

"Jane?"

Nothing.

"Jane?"

She looked over. Jane's eyes were closed, one hand still gripping the steering wheel. "Jane!" she cried, frantic. She reached out and touched Jane's neck, nearly fainting with relief when she detected her pulse, rapid but strong. "Jane, she whispered. "Detective Frost, please get the black bag out of the back of the truck, if it's still there. Hurry, please."

Frost slammed his shoulder into the door until it opened, sliding out of the cab with a groan. He returned a moment later with Maura's bag.

"There's a packet of smelling salts in there, could you find them please?" Her voice was controlled, tight, a hair's breadth from sheer panic. Frost fished around in the bag, retrieved the small packet. He handed it to Maura, and she tried to keep her hands from shaking as she cracked it open and waved it under Jane's nose.

Jane jerked, her eyes fluttering open. "What happened?" she mumbled.

"We hit a barrier," she said. "And then a tree. Jane, are you hurt?"

"My side," she said, wincing. "My ribs."

Maura felt gently along Jane's ribcage, which had made contact with the door when the truck slammed into the tree. "I don't think you broke any," she breathed, relief flooding her. "But you may have cracked some."

"Great," Jane said, feigning excitement. "Wheeee."

"We have to get you out of the truck, though, and it'll hurt, so I want you to squeeze my hand, okay?"

"Sure thing, doc," Jane grimaced as Maura unbuckled her seatbelt and helped slide her across to the passenger side.

"Does it hurt to breathe?"

"Well," Jane said, pausing as a jolt of pain shot through her side, "yeah."

"Okay, you've most likely cracked at least two ribs. We'll have to tape them."

"Wheeee," Jane mumbled again, swinging her legs out of the truck with difficulty.

Frost helped Maura ease Jane to a standing position.

"Now what?"

"I don't know," Maura said, her brows knitting together with concern. "I'm not sure where we are, or what's nearby. I've got plenty of cartridges for the rifle, and there's more ammunition in the back, but—"

"Finally," a voice called from across the road.

Jane, Maura, and Frost snapped their heads around in unison, gaping.

"I didn't think you'd ever get here," Donna said, dropping her rifle to her side. "Come on, the beer's gonna get warm."

* * *

A/N: WHAT.


	10. Erebus

Maura, Jane, and Frost stood in shocked silence for a moment. Donna smiled faintly, shook her head, pitched her cigarette butt to the side of the road.

"You shouldn't litter," Maura said without thinking. "And you should quit smoking, it's very bad for you."

"Uh-huh," Donna replied, crossing to meet them. "I'll be sure to think about that when I'm picking up trash as a reanimated corpse."

"What the hell are _you_ doing here?" Frost demanded. "I mean," he said, his tone softening but still wary, "this is pretty surprising."

"It wouldn't be half as fun if it wasn't a surprise," Donna shrugged. "Though I didn't expect it would be quite so dramatic."

"Did you—ahh," Jane gasped as she bent the wrong way, her damaged ribs sending jolts of pain whistling through her body. "Did _you_ put that thing there?" She jerked her thumb toward the concrete barrier, now adorned with bright green swathes of automobile paint.

"I figured you'd stop one way or another," Donna said, shrugging again. "Didn't think you'd test its impact resistance so . . . uh . . . forcefully, though."

"Jane has issues with paying attention to what she's doing," Maura said as Donna tucked her arm under Jane's other side, helping Maura ferry Jane across the road. Frost hung back slightly, his hand on his pistol.

"No need to worry, Detective Frost," Donna called over her shoulder. "There's only good guys and bad guys left, and I'm one of the good guys."

"Yeah, well," Frost mumbled, just loudly enough for everyone to hear, "I'm gonna keep the safety off for now, if it's all the same to you."

"All the same to me," Donna said, disappearing with Jane and Maura into the thick bushes lining the road.

Maura grasped Jane's hand, slung around her shoulders, to help steady her as they navigated the rough track beaten through the brush. Jane groaned softly as they ducked down to avoid a low-hanging tree branch.

"Where are we?" Maura asked.

"About twenty miles west of Sudbury," Donna replied. "We're about to go downhill, Jane, try to keep it quiet."

"I'll keep it quiet," Jane muttered, though she couldn't help letting out a yelp of pain as they stumbled down a sudden steep embankment.

"Almost there," Donna said.

They turned sharply at a stand of trees and came out in a clearing, a small house standing at the far end. "Here we are," Donna said unceremoniously.

". . . outside Sudbury," Jane finished. "Great, just where I wanted to be."

"Would you rather still be in Boston?"

"No," Jane muttered. "Did you say you had beer?"

"I did indeed," Donna said. "Dr. Isles, do you think you can get her to the house? I've got a few medical supplies there, some tape, some painkillers. Detective Frost, I happen to know you've got your safety off, would you mind helping me check the perimeter?"

Frost narrowed his eyes at her, but nodded.

"Okay. You take the western edge, I'll take the eastern. We should be all right; it's early yet and we're pretty far from the water."

Maura's mind buzzed with a thousand questions even as she shouldered Jane across the field, taking care not to jostle her. She was overwhelmed with curiosity, with apprehension, with the adrenaline and lingering fear from the accident, the crawlers she'd helped massacre earlier that morning.

"Jane," she whispered once Donna was safely out of earshot, "what do you think is going on?"

"I have no idea," Jane groaned, holding her side. "I assumed she didn't make it back from the bay."

"Clearly your assumptions leave something to be desired," Maura said, helping Jane onto the small front porch. The house was tiny, clapboard and weatherbeaten. The chugging drone of a generator cut through the otherwise-placid morning air. "Sit down," she said, lowering Jane to a splintered wooden chair. "Don't press your side against anything."

"Aw, damn," Jane sighed. "'Press my cracked ribs against something hard' was right at the top of my list of things to do today, too."

"Sarcasm doesn't help anyone, Jane," Maura chided.

"It helps _me_."

"It helps you to what, exactly?"

Jane opened her mouth to speak as Frost and Donna came up the porch steps, holstering their weapons.

"We're clear," Donna said. "Detective Rizzoli, I know it's early and Dr. Isles might not approve, but would you like a beer?"

"Dr. Isles can disapprove all she wants," Jane said, making a face in response to the face Maura gave her.

"You stay there," Donna said. "I'll be right back."

"Jane," Frost said as soon as Donna had vanished into the small house, "I don't know if I like this."

"You don't like _anything_, Frost," Jane grumbled, rubbing gently at her side.

"But come on," he continued. "The last time we saw her she was shooting at hundreds—at _thousands_ of crawlers. We barely got away ourselves."

"I remember," she muttered. "Frost," she said, her voice low. He leaned in to hear her. "I think she's CIA. She showed me a State Department ID card."

"So yeah, let's just blindly trust the CIA agent who miraculously escaped the zombie horde."

"I don't think it was a miracle," Jane whispered. "I think she knows a lot more than we do about all of this. So let's _be nice_ because she's also giving us beer. Ow," she moaned as she bumped her side into the chair. "And painkillers."

"You shouldn't mix—" Maura began.

"And you're no fun either, Doctor . . . No-Fun."

"You can't expect_ anyone_ to think that was a good comeback," Frost grinned. "You hit your head in that car crash too?"

Jane scowled at him. She was on the verge of retort when Donna came back onto the porch, beer bottles jammed under one arm and a wad of ragged cloth under the other, a thick roll of medical tape and a small orange bottle in her hand.

"It's cold," Donna said, setting two of the beers down on a small side table and deftly popping the cap off the third by knocking it against the porch rail. "It's just me out here, so I figure what the hell, I'll use a little extra gas to power the fridge. Don't keep the lights on anyway." She handed the beer to Jane, who stared at it almost lovingly for a moment before taking a deep swallow. "They like the light. Crawlers, I mean."

"I thought you said we were safer because it's daylight," Frost frowned.

"Yeah, well, _everything's_ light when it's daytime, it doesn't attract 'em. They're like insects. Drawn to it in the dark."

Something about Donna's phrasing made Maura shiver. She accepted mutely the supplies Donna handed her.

"How did you know we'd be here?" Frost asked. Maura was grateful that he was asking the questions; Jane was still groggy from the accident and she herself was becoming aware of how much the events of the day had disoriented her. She realized she desperately wanted to sit quietly for even a moment, to collect and organize her thoughts, but at the same time knew she needed to hear everything Donna was saying.

"I figured you'd head west," Donna said, opening another beer and offering it to Frost, who shook his head. Donna shrugged and took a long pull. "And I knew there was only one bridge still standing, and this is the road it leads to."

"How did you know?"

"Because I took it too," she replied.

"How?"

Donna smiled. "I had connections. Connections that left me with knowledge of where to find transportation, and where to transport myself to."

"But you were totally okay with leaving the rest of us to die in Boston."

"The world is different than you want it to be, Detective Frost," Donna said, her voice suddenly dark, warning, but not entirely unkind. "The rules are different now."

"Yes," Maura whispered. They looked at her, but she was staring at the porch slats, rubbed smooth with time and use.

"I did what I had to do. I stayed behind as long as I could, but when I knew it was going to get out of control, I did what I needed to stay alive."

"Wait," Jane said, wincing as she tried to straighten up. "You knew things were going to 'get out of control'? What would you say things were before a bunch of military planes blew up a defenseless hospital filled with women and children? Totally fine, everything's A-okay, just don't mind the crawlers?"

"First of all, Jane," Donna said, "that hospital was two hours from being overrun. And second, the pilots didn't know about the women and children, and even if they had it wouldn't have stopped them from doing what they had to do."

"Who are they?" Jane asked. "Government?"

"Sort of."

"I think you'd better start getting a little clearer a little faster," Frost said, crossing his arms.

Donna sighed. "While I admire your tenacity, there are some things I just can't tell you."

"But I thought things were different now," he said.

"They are."

"So?"

Donna sighed again, toyed with her beer bottle. "All right. What do you want to know?"

"Uh, a lot. How you escaped from Pleasure Bay, for a start."

"Firepower," Donna said, half-smirking.

"They're not scared of bullets. If they were, we'd have seen the last of them a long time ago."

"Not that kind of firepower, Detective."

"Diana was right," Maura said suddenly. They looked at her again. "They're afraid of fire, aren't they?"

Donna smiled fully. "Very good, Dr. Isles. Like most creatures with more senses than brains, the crawlers fear fire. They're just animate bodies, you know, their brains are functionally useless. They're driven by the need for sustenance, they have some rudimentary motor control, but they can't think like you or I think. Well," she said, cocking her head and looking at Maura, "I probably can't think like you can, either."

Maura blinked, her brow furrowing slightly. She didn't notice Jane giving Donna a sudden sharp look, her features abruptly turning abashed when she realized what she was doing.

"But _how_," Maura said, her voice edged with a keen desperation. "How did this _happen?"_

"Here," Donna popped the top off the third beer and handed it to her.

"No thank you," Maura said automatically.

"Trust me," she said. Maura accepted the proffered bottle hesitantly, looking at Donna with more than a hint of unease. "Have you heard of Project Erebus?"

They looked at her blankly.

"No," she sighed, "probably not. It was an eyes-only State proposal involving biological weaponry."

"Wait," Maura breathed.

"Don't tell me you've heard of it," Jane cried, wincing again. "But of course you probably have," she muttered.

"Yes," Maura said. "I have. I was researching the effects of long-term exposure to various chemical compounds in isolated regions of the North China Plain-"

"Some light weekend reading," Jane muttered to Donna, who grinned. Frost frowned at her.

"—especially in reference to a series of reported cases of members of the indigenous population undergoing what appeared to be an unusual and dramatic physiological reaction to an unknown agent," Maura finished, ignoring Jane's aside.

"And . . .?" Jane prompted.

"I saw a reference to Project Erebus, but when I clicked on the link it didn't lead to anything."

"Well, I was hoping more for an 'and turns out it was a chemical that turns people into zombies,' but I guess 'the link didn't go anywhere' is good too."

"Project Erebus was undergoing preliminary testing in an area of the Gobi too remote for anything other than helicopter access," Donna said. "The government—well, _a _government—was attempting to develop new weapons to be used against mass targets."

"Like who?" Frost asked, taking Jane's beer.

"It was initially developed during the Cold War as a way to eliminate remaining populations in the event of widespread nuclear deployment on American soil," Donna said, her tone so matter-of-fact that none of them reacted for a moment.

"Wait," Jane said after a beat, grabbing her beer back from Frost. "Wait. The government created a chemical weapon that would kill everybody who was left after the Russians or whoever tried to nuke us into tomorrow?"

"Would you want to live in a world like that, Jane?" Maura said softly, not looking at her. "Everything you know destroyed, everyone you love dead or dying from radiation exposure?

"You're living in a world like that now, Dr. Isles," Donna answered, more gently than any of them would have expected.

Maura was silent. She stared across the field, the long grass fluttering slightly in the breeze. She shivered. The sun still shone brightly but it was noticeably less intense, the wind cool, carrying with it a breath of winter.

"So this Project Erebus—" Jane started.

"Why don't you let Dr. Isles take care of your injuries?" Donna interrupted. "You can't be comfortable like that."

"But-"

"Go on, Jane," Frost said, giving her a meaningful look. "You'll feel better."

Jane tried to frown as she stood up, but was unable to do either. Instead she let out a soft groan. "Someone help me up," she grumbled. Maura moved wordlessly to her side, knelt and pulled Jane's arm around her shoulders. Jane hissed in pain as she rose to her feet, glancing at Frost, who was eyeing Donna with more than a little distrust though Jane could tell he was beginning to accept what she was saying.

Donna handed Maura the supplies she'd set down and pushed the front door open without standing. "Bedroom's to the back on the left, but you can't miss it. I've got a well out here, so there's some water, but the pressure's bad and it's cold only from the tap."

Maura nodded, helping Jane over the threshold. "Ow!" Jane cried. "Be careful, Maura, I'm very delicate."

Maura didn't respond, and Jane frowned slightly. "Maura?" she said.

Nothing. Jane sighed.

They made it into the small back bedroom and Maura set the bandages and tape on the bed. "Take your shirt off," she said, her voice expressionless.

Jane gulped. She cursed her heart, which had the habit of racing at the most inappropriate times, and tried to lift her shirt over her head.

"I can't," she mumbled. "Hurts."

Maura sighed. "Well," she said after a moment, "I hope you're not too attached to it."

"Why, what do you—hey!" Jane cried as Maura crossed to her and, with one sharp tug at a frayed spot, ripped her shirt open from collar to waist. Jane blushed scarlet.

_She's just taking care of your ribs, Jane. Your cracked ribs, remember? Crawlers and car accidents and conspiracies, remember?_

But the cool pressure of Maura's fingertips carefully exploring Jane's side was obscuring even the most immediate of threats. She could vaguely hear Donna and Frost talking on the porch and strained to make out their conversation; anything to distract her mind from the way her body was responding to Maura's sensitive touch.

_Flamethrowers_, she thought Donna said. _Contamination_.

_This is so serious_, Jane thought. _I need to be out there. I need to hear this. I need to be able to think about—_

"You need to stop breathing so fast," Maura said. Jane couldn't parse her tone.

"Okay," she gasped, trying to stop breathing entirely.

"I suspect you've cracked the fourth and fifth _costae verae_," Maura muttered.

"English, please."

"Ribs, Jane," Maura sighed. "That one wasn't even difficult."

"Is it bad?"

"Mostly just painful. I'm going to bind them to prevent further degradation of the fracture. It's not a technique generally endorsed by most medical professionals but . . . well . . ." she paused, "I don't get the impression there are very many medical professionals left to criticize me," she finished. Jane saw she was blinking rapidly, was overcome with the fear that Maura was about to start crying again.

_I hate it when you cry_, she thought. _Because I don't know how to make you stop and I wish to God I did._

Maura lifted her hands from Jane's body and Jane felt cool air rush in, felt acutely the place Maura's fingers had been. She shivered. "Ow," she muttered.

"Did I hurt you?" Maura looked at her, deep concern on her face.

"No," Jane said quickly. "No, you—didn't," she finished lamely. _You couldn't_.

"Well," Maura said, unwinding the long piece of cloth Donna had given her, "I need you to hold this on your good side until I can get it anchored."

Jane nodded, pressing the cloth to her skin. Maura carefully wound the fabric around Jane's body. "Breathe out as much as you can," she said softly. "This needs to be tight to keep the ribs from moving too much."

Jane exhaled slowly, trying to keep her breath from shuddering as Maura pressed gently on her stomach, holding the binding in place.

"All right," she said after winding the fabric once more around Jane's torso, tucking it into itself and securing it with a long piece of medical tape. "That should hold, how does it feel?"

"Like the time Ma tried to make me take etiquette classes so I'd be a lady," she said, her breath strained. "Only time I've ever worn a real corset, and I still couldn't stand up straight." She smiled wryly at Maura. Tried not to think about her mother.

Maura looked into her eyes, offering a soft smile in return, and Jane could see she understood exactly what it was she was trying not to think about. She straightened up, suddenly very close to Jane, their bodies inches apart.

"Does it hurt?" Maura murmured, placing both her hands lightly on Jane's ribcage.

"No," Jane breathed. "Ow. I mean, I guess yes."

"All right," Maura said, turning away and picking up the small orange bottle, examining the label. "Take two of these, but no more beer, and you need to lie down for a while. They'll make you sleepy, but you could use the rest."

"No more beer?" Jane pouted. "What if I just take one, could I have beer then?"

Maura didn't reply, simply shook two pills into her hand and held them out to Jane, who plucked them off Maura's palm, scowling. "I hate taking pills."

"Do I need to roll them in a piece of Bibb lettuce and coat them with protein powder?"

Jane stared at her, incredulous.

"It's what I did for Bass when he had worms," Maura shrugged.

"I'm not a turtle, Maura."

"Neither was he," Maura said. Jane could see her eyes darken. "Take your pills," she said, her voice suddenly high, strained. "I'll come and check on you in a while."

She turned and quickly left the room. "Maura! Wait! Where are you going?"

"I just need to be alone for a while," Maura said, not coming back into the room.

"But it's not safe!"

"I'll ask Donna, I'm sure she wouldn't advise me as to a location that would put me in harm's way."

Jane heard her footsteps moving toward the front door, the low ripple of voices on the porch. She frowned, tried to breathe, was nearly knocked over by the stabbing pain in her side. She looked down at the pills in her hand, shrugged, and swallowed them dry.

_I hope these work_, she thought, as she carefully lowered herself onto the small but comfortable bed, wedging a pillow under her side. She thought of Maura, of the way Maura's eyes darkened with a pain that wasn't physical, a pain harder for Jane to understand. _I hope they work soon_.

She closed her eyes. Within minutes, she was lost in dreamless sleep.

* * *

So I wanted to get some things explained, but not be too explain-y. I used to go on long, long drives with my dad-like, cross-country drives-and he'd listen to a lot of Art Bell (Google that dude, it's crazy) so I have this deeply ingrained knowledge of conspiracy theories that I really just don't even care about, but sometimes the things we know come in handy. Plus, my love of _The X-Files _is undying and eternal, so I suppose I care a _little_ bit about conspiracy theories. I hope you're into it! xoxoxoxo!


	11. Orphans

Maura sat in the place Donna had shown her, a small hollow between three large trees at the edge of the clearing. She could still see the house easily, was perhaps twenty yards from it, her rifle tucked against her leg, but being more or less surrounded by trees, birds singing sweetly, the rustling whisper of the leaves in the wind, made her feel almost at peace for the first time in weeks.

She closed her eyes, inhaled deeply, noticed the warm, sweetish odor of rotting leaves and fallen fruit, the rich mineral scent of soil, the faintest undercurrent of ozone being carried on the breeze. A soft breath of autumn clematis, the smell so delicate, so clean and purely beautiful that she felt a lump rise in her throat. She pressed her eyes tightly together, took another deep breath, tried to focus on the quiet around her, the breeze on her face, the feeling of being alone without being lost.

It was difficult for a long while to keep the hundreds of desperately important questions from crowding her mind. She knew it was desperately important that she manage to find calm, even for a moment, so that she could replenish her stores of strength and focus if only incrementally.

She needed to not think.

Finally, after the sun had begun to filter down through the lower branches, she felt the hard knot that had been tied tightly around her heart begin to loosen and fall away. She felt herself breathing slowly, easily, saw the soft white light filling her body with each inhalation, saw the dark gray smoke being pushed out as she exhaled. The constant low murmuring at the back of her mind receded. The smells of warm leaves and clematis began to overtake the smells of fire and death.

She breathed.

She had been sitting for several minutes, as close to transcendence as she supposed she would get, when she heard the deliberate rustle of foliage that meant something was moving. It was moving toward her. Her eyes flew open and she reached reflexively for her rifle, backing herself against one of the thick tree trunks, her pure focus on eternity shifting abruptly into a pure focus on her surroundings.

The rustling was coming from behind her, moving through the undergrowth at a steady pace. She carefully, quietly slid forward until she was sitting on her knees, then slowly pushed herself up so that she was kneeling low, her weapon aimed toward the sound. She silently cursed herself for staying out so much longer than she'd meant to, the dusk was rushing in and she was having difficulty making out shapes under the canopy of the trees. She began to slowly back around the trunk, deciding to get to the clearing as quickly as possible, when the brush immediately in front of her trembled for a moment and a young deer picked its way around the branches.

She gasped softly, not wanting to disturb the animal. It lifted its small head, its ears twitching, its enormous liquid eyes seeming to focus on her.

Maura had not spent much of her life engaged with nature, outside of what she encountered on various school grounds and her mother's friends' country estates. She was fascinated by the fawn, which still retained faint traces of its youthful mottling and seemed to be totally unafraid of her as it took a few awkwardly graceful strides in her direction, pausing to investigate a patch of moss clinging to one of the tree trunks.

Maura knelt back down slowly, not taking her eyes off the fawn. She set her rifle aside, clasped her hands together, watched the animal as it nosed at foliage, as it drew even nearer to her until it was so close she could have reached out and touched it.

_It's a wild animal. Deer carry ticks. Ticks carry disease._

She shoved her caution as far down as she could and, with a soft inhalation of breath, extended her hand toward the fawn. It froze for a moment, lifted its head abruptly, but it did not run.

Maura held her breath.

After a moment the fawn slowly lowered its head, its shiny black nose just brushing her palm. She smiled widely, she felt a childlike exhilaration as the deer pushed its nose against her hand and tentatively licked her fingers.

"Hello," Maura whispered. The deer took half a step back, startled. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I didn't mean to frighten you."

The fawn gazed at her, its brown eyes huge and shimmering in the fading amber light. It lifted its forefoot to take a hesitant step toward her when an enormous crash of thunder rattled leaves from the trees and sent it sprinting off into the woods so fast Maura couldn't tell which direction it had gone.

She gasped at the thunderclap, blinked as a brilliant flash of lighting ripped through the darkening sky above her. She breathed deeply, the metallic tang of ozone filling her nose and mouth just as another tremendous crash of thunder rolled across the sky, tearing open the dark clouds that had amassed while she wasn't paying attention. She gasped again as a sudden downpour pounded through the trees, stripping them of their leaves, soaking her to the skin in seconds.

Maura didn't run back to the house. Instead she stood between the trees, lifting her face to the rain, letting it pour down on her, letting it wash away the dirt and gunpowder and traces of blood that had been clinging to her since the darkness came, letting it wash away the pain and fear and sorrow. She began to feel clean, for the first time since the world had changed.

Lightning continued to illuminate the branches, which were by now almost bare, at least compared to how they had been when Maura had come to the spot earlier in the day. Thunder crackled across the sky, so close and so loud she thought it might crush her.

She stood there for several minutes, not caring that she was completely soaked, not caring that the wind had turned distinctly cold and harsh. She was at the mercy of the elements, she felt weirdly at peace in the knowledge that no matter what horrors man might have engineered to destroy itself they were still not the most powerful force; she felt oddly comforted by feeling so small.

She realized she ought to go back to the house; she'd been out much longer than she'd promised. She wondered briefly why nobody had come looking for her, though she imagined Jane was knocked out from the pills and the pain and the need to sleep, and that Donna knew where she was if she needed her. As Maura picked up her rifle she realized she'd been nearly visible from the house the whole time; all anyone would need to do would be take a few steps from the porch to see every space between the trees.

She smiled, grateful to Donna for leaving her in peace. She slipped her rifle over her shoulder, turning back to look at the dense greenbelt once more, though she could hardly see it except when lightning illuminated it in brief bursts. The rattling thunder made her shiver with a deep, unconscious pleasure and she briefly considered riding out the night underneath one of the trees, but she suddenly heard her name, faintly, almost obscured by the sounds of the storm.

"Maura!"

She knew at once it was Jane; Donna knew exactly where she was and wouldn't have called out for her. She felt a twinge of anger, immediately replaced with a faint shame. It wasn't fair of her to be upset with Jane for being worried, she told herself, after all, not counting Frost, they were all each other had.

_But she could have asked Donna where I was. _

"Maura!"

She could hear Jane getting closer, could hear the frantic edge to her voice. Maura frowned slightly, then shook her head and stepped out from the trees to the edge of the clearing.

Jane saw her immediately. Her face was compressed with worry, her hair and clothes limp and heavy with rain. Maura could see the outline of the bandages wrapped around her ribs and felt another flash of anger.

_She's just going to hurt herself more, and I'll have to take care of her, she's my responsibility—_

Maura paused, suddenly overcome with a mix of emotions too complex to immediately understand. She wanted to care for Jane, she felt pleased and useful at being needed by her, but she wished Jane would stop risking so much, would stop putting herself so near to harm, and say it was because she was looking out for Maura.

_She's looking out for me, but for what? _

Maura remembered the night before, the sweetness of the dawn, laying in bed with Jane curled around her, Jane not pulling away when Maura reached for her. The incomparable loveliness of feeling safe and comforted in Jane's arms, the pleasure of that intimacy, even if it was half-unconscious. She looked at Jane now, her hair clinging to her face, her expression half-concerned, half-angry, running toward Maura.

"Maura!" Jane cried. "What the hell are you doing out here? Do you have any idea how worried I was?"

Maura looked at her incredulously. "Did you even ask Donna or Frost before you disregarded my instructions to stay still and came running out here in the middle of a thunderstorm?" she asked, her voice chilly.

"What—I—" Jane looked at her, confused. "Ask them what?"

"Where I _was_, Jane!" Maura cried. "Donna showed me this place, she knew it was safe, she's been checking on me all afternoon." Maura supposed this was likely enough to be true that it didn't entirely qualify as a lie. "But I suppose you woke up, probably with the thunder, and when you didn't see me at your bedside you panicked, didn't bother to ask anyone, just _assumed_ you were the only person who had my interests at heart, just _assumed_ I was in danger and incapable of taking care of myself, and took off running despite my _specifically_ telling you to stay still because of the cracked ribs that you got because you couldn't pay attention to what you were doing, ribs that _I _bound for you, that I'll now have to rebind while worrying that you've hurt yourself worse because of this, hurt yourself in a way that I can't fix, and all because of . . . of what, Jane?"

Jane stood, frozen, mouth agape.

Maura crossed her arms, the deepening darkness and the curtain of rain separating them making it difficult for her to see the emotions playing across Jane's face.

"Maura," she said, but didn't complete her thought.

"We should go in," Maura said brusquely, walking past her. "You're at heightened risk for respiratory infection and I don't have the antibiotics."

She strode across the clearing, not looking back. She stomped up onto the porch, barely acknowledging Donna and Frost, who appeared to have resolved their differences enough to be drinking beer and watching the storm. She pushed roughly into the house, pausing at the threshold just long enough to wrestle her sodden boots off and drop her rifle next to the door. She wrung out her hair, taking care to get most of the water on the small rug at the entryway, and stripped off her jacket as she went into the bedroom, taking half a second to notice someone had retrieved the supplies from the car and stacked them neatly against the wall before slamming the door and collapsing on the bed.

She lay there, too exhausted and angry to cry, for a long moment. Finally, she heard Jane stomp onto the porch, heard low muttering from outside, heard footfalls nearing the bedroom door. A quiet knock.

"Maura?" Jane called softly. "Maura, I'm sorry."

_Do you even know what it is you're sorry for?_

Her mind flashed back to the hospital, to her room, to Jane standing in front of her saying the same thing in the same way. She remembered Diana leaning forward and kissing her unexpectedly. Her surprise. Her acceptance.

_Intimacy is a balm_.

The way Jane had held her in the night. The way Jane hadn't let go.

"Can I come in?"

Maura sat up, bracing herself on the edge of the bed. She thought for a long moment. She realized she needed to check on Jane's ribs, make sure she hadn't hurt herself worse. She sighed.

"Yes," she said, her voice flat.

Jane pushed the door open slowly, hesitantly.

"Hi," she whispered.

Maura looked at her expectantly.

"I'm—I'm sorry I went running out there. You're right. I was worried when I woke up and there was the storm and you weren't there and I _know_ you said to lay down and rest but Maura, I was so worried, I-"

"That's fine, Jane," she replied, her voice still neutral. "I appreciate your concern."

Several emotions flashed across Jane's face before settling on a look of wounded resignation.

"I'm sorry," she said again, and Maura could see she meant it, even if she didn't quite know why. She sighed.

"Come here," she said, indicating the space next to her on the bed, "and take off your shirt."

"But I can't-"

"You managed to run through a thunderstorm with two cracked ribs," Maura reminded her, rising and retrieving her supplies. "You can take off your own shirt."

Maura wasn't looking too closely but she thought she saw a faint hint of disappointment on Jane's face as she lifted the hem of her sodden tank top, grimacing as she pulled it over her head.

"Stand up," Maura said, crossing back to her, putting the dry bindings and tape on the bedside table. Jane lifted herself off the bed with a faint groan. Maura carefully peeled the tape off the strip of fabric wrapped around Jane's torso and unwound the cloth, tutting as she revealed a deeply mottled bruise covering half of Jane's side.

"What is it?" Jane asked, her voice high, anxious. "Did I break it?"

"Possible," Maura said, pressing gently. Jane winced. "You may have caused some soft-tissue damage to the fourth intercostal but I can't be sure. I'll just have to rebind it and you will absolutely have to stay still, Jane, that's an order."

"Yes ma'am," Jane mumbled, a slight smile on her face.

Maura picked up a towel that had been folded and left on the lower shelf of the bedside table, gingerly wiping the water from Jane's skin. She positioned the edge of the binding on Jane's good side. "Hold it here," she murmured. Jane put her hand on the fabric, her fingers brushing Maura's briefly.

"Thank you for taking care of me, Maura," she said quietly. "I wouldn't be here without you. I'm lucky to have you and I'm sorry I do stupid things."

"You don't really _have_ me though, do you?" Maura replied before she could stop herself. A furious blush rose into her cheeks and she was glad she was standing behind Jane, adjusting the wrap, so Jane wouldn't see her embarrassment.

Jane didn't say anything, though Maura could see her shoulders stiffen. "Breathe out completely," she said as normally as possible, though her fingers trembled as they brushed against Jane's exposed skin.

"I'm sorry," Jane whispered suddenly.

"For what?"

"For . . . I don't know, exactly. But it's something, and it's . . . it's awful, Maura, feeling so . . . unsure all the time."

"These are extremely unsure times," Maura said, trying despite herself to give Jane an excuse not to say anything of significance, trying to protect Jane from having to feel vulnerable, even though Maura realized what she most wanted was for the inexplicable, the indefinable wall between them to disappear. She had seen Jane fragile before, had seen her nearly broken, but she had never seen her soft and defenseless and so deeply uncertain as she was right now, and it made Maura nervous, it made Maura want to care for her, to make the thing making Jane so scared go away, even though it was her, even though it was what she wanted.

"Yeah," Jane muttered. "Maura, I—"

"Yes, Jane?"

An enormous clap of thunder rattled the windows of the house. Jane jumped, yelped in pain, clutched at Maura's hand as it reached around to check the bandages, pulled Maura tightly against her for a moment before seeming to realize what she was doing and abruptly letting go.

"Why don't you let me touch you, Jane?" Maura asked suddenly, with a boldness she didn't quite understand.

Jane whirled around, her eyes wide. "I—"

"You don't," she whispered, deciding to plunge onward despite the tendrils of anxiety shooting through her body. "Why?"

"Because . . ." Jane drifted off, her eyes searching Maura's for some indication of how to respond. Maura simply looked at her, waiting. "Because . . . I don't know, Maura. Because everything would change and I don't know what would happen except things would be different and I'm so scared of losing you that I can't even _think_ about it. Okay?" She sounded almost angry, turned away and started wringing out her still-dripping hair with the towel.

Maura stood where she was, unconsciously twisting the roll of medical tape around her finger. Jane didn't look back at her.

"I need to finish taping that," Maura said finally. "Please turn around."

Jane froze for half a second, turned slowly. Maura avoided her eyes. She worked as quickly as she could to secure the fabric at Jane's side, then moved to set the tape down.

Jane reached out and grabbed her hand. Maura's breath caught in her throat.

Jane ran her thumb along the side of Maura's wrist, down her palm. Maura shivered.

"I don't want to lose you," she mumbled.

Maura suddenly felt as though she might faint.

"You don't really even have me," she murmured.

"You're all I have," Jane said, still not looking at her, still running her thumb along the crease of Maura's palm.

"It's late," Maura whispered, her mouth suddenly very dry. "You need to lay down and get some more rest."

Jane shrugged. "Yeah."

"We could all do with some rest."

"Yeah."

"I'm going to go talk to Donna about our sleeping arrangements while we're here, you need the bed for your ribs but I don't want to be an imposition—"

She gasped as Jane suddenly pulled her hand close, pulled her body close, leaned down and kissed her without prelude.

Lightning ricocheted around the room, thunder crashed, but Maura didn't see it, didn't hear it. All she heard was her own heartbeat, crashing like thunder in her ears.


	12. Breathless

The rainstorm caught them by surprise. They'd been sitting on the porch, drinking beer, slowly becoming accustomed to each other, when the first thunderclap caused them both to leap out of their seats.

"Whoa," Frost muttered, wiping spilled beer on his pants.

"I'll say," Donna replied. "Looks like it's gonna be a good one."

"You think we should get Dr. Isles?"

"Nah," Donna said, leaning around the edge of the porch, spotting the sleeve of Maura's jacket against the trees. "She heard it. I imagine she'll come back when she wants to."

Frost shrugged. "All right. As long as you think it's safe."

"She's safe." Donna settled back in her seat. "You've seen her shoot. Be glad she's on your side."

Frost chuckled. "Yeah. I gotta admit, it was a little surprising."

"How come?"

He shrugged again. "She's just so . . . _pretty_. I mean," he added hastily, "she's smarter than you and me put together and she pokes around in dead bodies for fun, which, ugh, but . . . still."

"Yeah, I know what you mean. But she's a strong lady. I imagine she's saved your ass before."

"Yeah."

They watched the sky shimmer and dissolve into torrential sheets of rain, the impossibly bright bolts of lightning slashing across the growing darkness.

Suddenly there was a rapid thudding from inside the house and the front door burst open. Jane stood on the porch for a moment, disoriented and panicked.

"Where's Maura?" she cried, not waiting for an answer before stumbling down the steps and into the clearing, clutching at her side.

". . . and then there's Jane," Frost sighed. "Hey, Jane—"

"Let her go," Donna cut him off.

"But—"

"Detective Frost, we're in this for the long haul. And I haven't know them very long but I'm already sick of watching them pretend like nothing's going on. You've know them for—"

"Years," he sighed, shaking his head.

"How do you even put up with it?"

He lifted his shoulders. "It's kind of funny."

Donna grimaced. "It's driving me fucking crazy." She took a swallow of her beer. "You want another one?"

"Why the hell not," Frost said, stretching out his legs. Donna ducked into the house. Frost stared out at the clearing, the rain so heavy it was like a rippling screen dropped in front of the porch.

"Maura!" Frost heard Jane calling faintly over the rumble of the thunder and the steady hiss of rain. He smiled. It was kind of funny.

Donna came back out onto the porch with two beers.

"Good thing you found that truck," Frost said.

"Crawlers I can handle," Donna popped the cap off her bottle. "But the rest of my life without beer? No thanks."

Another flash of lightning and burst of thunder.

Maura came stomping around the side of the house and up the porch steps, soaked through. She nodded curtly at them and pushed into the house, slamming the door behind her.

Frost raised his eyebrows at Donna. She shook her head, amused.

They sat and watched the storm for a few minutes, until Jane came limping up the steps.

"Find her?" Frost grinned.

"Fuck you," she muttered.

"Hey now," he said. "Don't get mad just because you didn't wear your raincoat."

"Come on, Frost!" Jane cried. She groaned. "This is _just _what I need."

"Yeah, it's what I've been clamoring for too," Donna said dryly. "I'm sure Detective Frost would agree."

Jane didn't speak. She gave them both a pained look before grimacing and grabbing her side.

"You're gonna have to go talk to her," Frost said. "If only to make sure you didn't puncture a damn lung."

"Fuck you," she muttered again, pushing into the house.

Frost and Donna chuckled as the door slammed again.

"Women," he sighed.

"You have a girlfriend, Frost? A wife?"

"Nah," he said. "I mean, I'm glad. Now. Because of . . ." he drifted off.

"Yeah," Donna said. "Still surprises me, though."

"How come?"

"You're a good-looking guy, smart, you seem to actually _like_ women, which is refreshing."

He grinned. "Thank you. I had a fiancée once, it didn't work out. Obviously. I guess . . . well, nobody ever wants to admit they've married the job, you know? But that's what happened. To both of us."

"And you didn't even have a casual thing going on with anyone else?"

"Maybe one or two," he said, grinning wider. "I mean, I'm not a monk."

"Good man," Donna said, lifting her beer. Frost returned the toast.

"And you?"

"I married the job before I even had the job," she said.

"So . . . nobody?"

"Nope."

"Come on, not even in high school?"

"Sometimes people are born to do a thing," she said. "I was born to do what I do."

"And what _is_ that?" Frost asked. "Exactly. I mean, I get that you're CIA, but what? Spy? Assassin? Desk jockey?"

"A little of each. Mostly paperwork. Like anything."

Frost leaned back, closed his eyes. "Man, I do not miss paperwork."

"Amen to that."

They sat back for a while, watching the storm.

"So what now?" Frost asked, slightly hesitant.

Donna didn't look at him. "This," she said.

"This?"

"What else do you think there is, Detective? Anywhere you go you'll find death and destruction. You'll find some survivors, maybe, but they're working hard on tracking down everyone they can."

"Who's this 'they' you keep talking about? I mean, you said it's the government, but—"

"I said it was _a_ government," Donna cut in. "I know you don't put much stock in conspiracy theories, but this time it's not a theory."

"So . . . some old rich white dudes sitting around a big conference table ten stories underground, plotting the destruction of the human race?"

"There's a couple of old rich black dudes too," Donna said wryly. "The apocalypse is more diverse than you'd think."

"But that's what they're doing."

"More or less."

"Why now?"

Donna sighed. "Accidents happen," she shrugged, lifting the beer to her lips.

"Wait," Frost said. "You're telling me this—_all_ this—was an _accident?_"

"I am," Donna replied. "It only took one accidental uncontrolled exposure. Well, it _would _only have taken one, but it was a little bigger than that. A team we sent into the Gobi . . . lost control of the situation."

"So this is all over the world?"

She shook her head. "Not entirely. Australia's fine, and northern Europe, most of sub-Saharan Africa-but I don't know if I'd call them "fine" down there in general. The damage-control teams have stopped most of the spreading, mostly by blowing everything up."

"And nobody's come in to help? Man, you'd think Sweden would be all over this."

"Would you, Detective Frost?" Donna asked, her voice serious. "If you knew the entire population of South America was being turned into brainless crawling lumps of flesh, and if you were to go there it would probably happen to you too, would you still go? Or would you lock your doors and hold your breath?"

Frost was silent for a moment. "Good point."

They sat in silence again for several minutes.

"So," Frost said softly, "this is it."

"Pretty much. I'm sorry."

"I guess . . ." he said slowly, "I guess it's just . . . living, now."

"That's the spirit," Donna replied. "And who knows. We'll have to head out of here eventually, whether because of crawlers or bombers or those two," she indicated Jane and Maura with a brief toss of her head, "not being able to stop fucking or fighting. And when that happens, we might find some nice girl for you to settle down with. Anything's possible. Plus," she said, tipping the bottle toward him, "the odds are good you'll be the only man for miles."

"Yeah, what's up with that? We've really only found women and children, but not any men."

"We have very good scientists, Detective."

He frowned, quizzical.

"Project Erebus was far more subtle than just your run-of-the-mill doomsday scenario. The engineers realized it would take some time to spread, even though it moves quickly, so in order to maximize the impact they targeted it to be the most effective in altering the genetic material of adult males, though obviously it's fatal to everyone."

"Take out the people in power first," Frost muttered. "It'd be brilliant if it wasn't so evil."

"Still brilliant," she said. "And a real boon for feminism. But yeah, definitely evil. You sort of have to admire it, if only to keep from losing your goddamned mind."

"So what's to say if we go somewhere I won't get turned? That all of us won't?"

"Like any virus—even though this isn't technically a virus, it still behaves like one—once it gets through the first big wave of death, there's not enough of a population to sustain it, and the virus itself dies out. Like the Black Plague."

Frost nodded. "Okay. Sure."

"I'm sure Dr. Isles would be able to explain that part better."

"I wouldn't bet on that," Frost said. "There's no Google any more, I doubt I'd have any idea what she was talking about."

Donna smiled.

The thunder was receding, the rain less intense. "It's cold," Frost said, shivering.

"Summer can't last forever."

"No, I guess not. You got any coats?"

"One or two," she said. "Military surplus."

He nodded. "Haven't heard anything for a while," he said, indicating the house. "I wonder how it's going."

"I'd say if we haven't heard anything for a while it's probably going well."

"I'm gonna find out." He stood up, picking up his empty bottles. Donna shook her head, grinning.

"Don't come running to me if you see something you didn't want to see," she called over her shoulder as Frost went into the house.

"Trust me," he said, leaning back out the door, "I'd wanna see that."

* * *

Maura's head was spinning.

Jane was holding her hand tightly, clasping it against her chest, Jane's other hand cupped around her cheek. Jane's mouth on hers.

She felt her knees begin to weaken, reached out and grasped Jane's waist, holding herself up by pressing herself to Jane's body.

The storm crackled around the house, lightning washing the room in intermittent bursts of white light, but Maura was oblivious to it. All she was conscious of was the pressure of Jane's body against hers, Jane's mouth against hers.

She had no sense of how long the kiss lasted, seconds or minutes or hours, though it felt like all of them at once.

Her eyes were closed and she gasped slightly as she felt Jane pulling her down to the edge of the bed, not breaking the kiss. Gradually Jane lowered her until they were laying flat, still pressed together, as the thunder rattled the windowpanes.

Maura suddenly realized her arm was pressed against Jane's injured side and she pulled back abruptly.

"Jane," she whispered.

Jane's face registered dozens of emotions in that brief moment, from bliss to terror.

"What," she whispered back, her voice tight.

"Am I hurting you?"

"Uh," Jane chuckled, "no."

"I mean, your ribs."

"Oh," she said. "Probably? But I don't care, Maura, I don't care." She stroked Maura's cheek with her thumb.

"I care," Maura murmured, adjusting her position so that Jane was laying flat on her back, Maura hovering slightly above her, avoiding Jane's injured side. "I meant what I said about hurting yourself in a way that I can't fix, Jane, and if you thought I was serious five minutes ago—"

"Okay," Jane breathed. It's fine, see?" She poked at her side, trying her hardest not to grimace in pain.

"All right," Maura said, moving to get up, "You need rest."

Jane pulled her back down and kissed her again.

"So do you," she mumbled.

Maura smiled against Jane's lips. "I suppose that's true as well." She returned Jane's kiss, shivering slightly as her hand rested on Jane's bare stomach.

They lay there, entwined, for several minutes, until the violence of the storm receded.

"It's cold," Jane said softly. Maura frowned, a look of tender concern on her face. "Let me get you something," she said, trying to get up again.

"I don't—" Jane glanced away bashfully.

"What is it? You need to stay warm and dry, Jane, because what I said earlier about respiratory infection, that's true too."

"I'm kind of scared to let go of you," Jane mumbled.

"Now that you have me, you mean?" Maura smiled sweetly, playfully.

Jane blushed, didn't look at her. "It's weird," she said, her voice faint.

"Is it bad?"

"No!" Jane cried, gasping as she twisted the wrong way. "No. It's just . . . weird."

"Are things as different as you feared they'd be?"

"Well . . ." Jane drifted off. "No, actually. Not at all."

"Good," Maura said, pressing her lips to Jane's forehead. "That's what I'd hoped. Now, if I promise to come back, will you let me go find you something warm to put on?"

"Okay," Jane said, still not releasing her.

"Jane," Maura sighed. "Let go."

"Not until you promise."

Maura smiled. "Jane," she said, her voice low, sweet, soft. "I promise I'll come back to you. Even if I'm only going across the room, I promise I'll come back."

"Okay," Jane whispered, releasing her hand. She shifted on the bed, wincing.

"You'll have to take another pill," Maura said. "Because I don't trust you to stay still."

"What do you mean, you don't trust me? That's not a very nice thing to say to someone who . . . uhh . . ."

"You love?" Maura said, her voice light.

"Yeah," Jane mumbled, blushing again. "That."

"Doesn't mean I think you'll manage to stay still without pharmaceutical assistance," Maura said, digging through one of the bags Frost and Donna had brought in from the truck. "Here," she said, pulling out a hooded sweatshirt, "this should help."

"I hate that one," Jane whined. "Why did you have to bring _that_ one?"

"Jane," Maura said, staring at her in exasperation.

"I'm just kidding, Maura," Jane grinned. "Thank you. Will you—uh, will you help me put it on?"

"Of course." Maura crossed back over to her, grabbing the towel on her way. "Sit up."

Jane pushed herself up with slight difficulty.

"Turn around."

She frowned slightly but slid until she was facing away from Maura.

"You shouldn't have gone outside like that, Jane," Maura said as she pulled Jane's wet hair away from her face, wrapping it gently in the towel, squeezing out the rainwater.

Jane smiled and closed her eyes, leaning back slightly as Maura worked on drying Jane's hair as thoroughly as possible. "Okay," she said, tossing the towel on the floor. "Arms up. _Carefully_," she added as Jane moved to raise them straight into the air.

"Ow," Jane whispered.

"Do you see now why I don't trust you? And don't make that face."

"How did you know I was making a face?"

"Because," Maura sighed, "you _always_ make a face." She tugged the sweatshirt down to Jane's waist. "Better?"

"I guess," Jane said. "Will you kiss me again?"

"Will you take a painkiller?"

"You know, it's funny," Jane said, "nothing seems to hurt right now."

Maura smiled brilliantly, cocking her head. "Jane," she chided, "while you're very sweet, not even hormonal dumping can overcome the pain of deep-tissue bruising. At least not for very long."

"You really know how to keep a mood going," Jane teased, accepting the pill Maura handed her. She popped it into her mouth and swallowed, grimacing with distaste. "Okay," she said sourly, "I did it."

"Very good, Detective," Maura said, leaning over and kissing her forehead again. Jane looked up at her, an expression of affronted disappointment on her face.

"I'm going to inform Donna of your progress," she said.

"Wait, you're going to do _what_?"

"Well, she and Frost ought to know you'll be needing to sleep here for a while, it seems polite to at least tell them before we lock the door."

"We—" Jane's breath caught in her throat.

"Yes," Maura said matter-of-factly, "it's much more efficient to share a bed than attempt to find two places to sleep, surely you can see that."

"Yeah," Jane grinned. "You're right. Of course."

Maura opened the door, nearly running into Frost, who pretended to look like he hadn't been standing directly next to it.

"Hello, Detective Frost," she said, her voice neutral. "Did you enjoy the storm?"

* * *

A/N: Okay, well, you know with this much adorableness must come the inevitable flip side. Everybody bask in the glow of smooching right now, okay? Just . . . remember it. Remember this moment. Also, though, remember that this is a story about the zombie apocalypse.


	13. The Lucky Ones

The weather grew steadily cooler. As the days passed a routine was established; Frost and Donna would rise early and scout for crawlers, for survivors, for planes or trucks, then set off to pick supplies from nearby abandoned houses. Maura found herself more or less domesticated, tending to the house, while Jane grumbled incessantly from her bed.

"Maura," she cried one afternoon. Maura sighed, dropped the spoon into her half-mixed bread dough.

"What?" she called, not bothering to go into the bedroom.

"This thing itches, can I take it off yet?"

"Does it still hurt?"

"No."

"Press on it. Gently." She cocked an ear toward the door, smiling and shaking her head when she heard Jane's muttered _ow_. "Not yet," she called.

Jane muttered something unintelligible.

Maura resumed working the flour into the dough, staring vacantly out the window. The trees were fully bare, the recent relentless rain having stripped them of any remaining leaves. The sun hadn't made an appearance in days, hiding behind thin gray clouds. She could see her breath when she went outdoors; Donna and Frost hadn't managed to find suitable overcoats yet so she avoided going outside as much as possible. She was relatively content to stay in the house with Jane; the past few days had been a welcome respite from the weeks of violence and death, and although she had been adamant with Jane about minimizing physical activity, their transition into partnership hadn't been without its benefits.

Jane had been anxious, hesitant to even hold Maura in the night, had been afraid of doing something wrong, of seeming too forward, of being unsure of how to behave, though Maura had quietly and kindly dissuaded her of each notion in turn. She smiled a little when she thought of how well she was managing to guide Jane through waters she herself was nearly ignorant of, but she supposed the relative ease with which they had both accepted the evolution of their relationship was proof enough that they were doing something right.

"Maura!"

Maura sighed again, tapped the spoon firmly against the bowl and set it on the counter. The kitchen was small, but it was equipped enough for her to be able to function enough to keep everyone as well-fed as possible given the circumstances. She was beginning to pride herself on her domestic skills, though she did occasionally look at the birds Donna brought in after spending an afternoon shooting with Frost, their gleaming viscera so familiar, with a feeling almost nostalgic before scraping the guts and dropping them in the bucket she kept next to her.

"Yes, Jane?" she called as sweetly as she could manage.

"Come in here!"

"I'm a little busy."

"Please?"

"Why don't you come out here?"

"Because I'm not supposed to move."

"You can _move_, Jane. You just can't run, or jump, or—"

"Or do anything fun, basically."

"Mm-hmm." Maura turned around to see Jane standing in the doorway, holding her side. "Does it hurt?" she asked, frowning and rushing over to her.

"No, I'm just used to standing this way, I guess. How much longer?"

"I'm afraid you'll be all tied up for at least another week," Maura said, a subtle smirk on her face. Jane pouted. "Pouting won't make it heal faster, in fact—and I think we've already discussed this, Jane—a negative mental attitude can slow the healing process."

Jane plastered an enormous fake smile on her face. "Gosh, Maura, I'm _so happy_ we're in this tiny shitbox in the middle of nowhere with Frost and the CIA."

"You're alive, Jane," Maura said, more sharply than she'd intended. Jane's face darkened.

"Sorry," she mumbled.

Maura looked up at her, trying to erase the crease from her brow. She smiled softly, leaned in, placed a gentle kiss on Jane's cheek. "Be a good patient and you'll be back to crashing cars in no time," she whispered.

"That's not exactly the first thing on my list," Jane grinned bashfully, looking away. Maura smiled widely and winked.

"Then be good, Detective."

"Yes ma'am," Jane mumbled. "Okay, now, come in here and look at this." She took Maura's hand and led her to the window. "Look, Maura," she breathed.

"What?"

"It's snowing."

Maura squinted out the window, was barely able to make out the first faint whispers of snow drifting through the air.

"It's beautiful," she said, "but it worries me."

"Yeah, me too, but it's the first snow of the year so you're not allowed to get all . . . _realistic_ about it," Jane said, putting her arm around Maura's waist. "You have to just watch it. It's the law."

"You'd know best," Maura murmured, nestling against Jane.

They stood and watched the snow build in intensity, fat white flakes spiraling lazily out of the sky.

"I hope it doesn't start sticking before Donna and Frost get back," Maura said suddenly, her voice spiked with concern.

"They'll be fine," Jane said, kissing the top of Maura's head. "Just look at it. It's so beautiful."

"Yes," Maura whispered. "It is."

After several silent minutes they heard Frost and Donna stomp up the steps to the house and push open the door.

"Snow!" Jane shouted, releasing Maura and running as quickly as her injured ribs would allow into the living room. "Isn't it great?"

"Yeah," Frost muttered, brushing snow off his sleeves. "Great."

"Don't do that in here!" Maura cried, coming into the room. "Detective Frost, Agent Ellison, please brush your clothes off on the porch. And that goes for everyone. This place is difficult enough to maneuver with four people without having to worry about someone slipping in a puddle and breaking their neck, since unless you found a traction unit this afternoon I _definitely_ don't have the supplies to manage that."

Donna and Frost sighed, dropped their small bundles on the floor, and headed back to the porch.

"You're gonna make a terrible mother," Jane sighed shaking her head. "I mean, you're worse than mine ever was _already_."

Maura smiled at her gently. She knew Jane needed to joke about the people they'd lost, the places and things they'd never see again, but it still tore at her heart too much even to think of their names. Their faces came to her sometimes in her dreams, their voices; she occasionally woke from nightmares steeped in fire and blood with tears on her cheeks. During the day she was able to keep herself busy, but at night, as she was falling asleep, she saw her parents, she saw Angela, she saw Diana.

_But not Carrie_.

Maura was grateful for the surprising mercy of her subconscious; she'd nearly forgotten what the little girl's face looked like.

_Stay with me. I'll keep you safe_.

"Hey, Maura?" Jane's voice was soft, loving. "You okay?"

"Yes," she said, though her uncertain breath belied her. "I'm fine, Jane. It's nothing."

"It's not _nothing_, Maura."

"It's nothing I want to talk about," she said briskly, offering a brief, bright smile. "I'm all right, Jane, I promise."

"Okay," Jane replied, though her eyes were focused on Maura with concern. "If you ever want to, you know, talk about it-"

"I'll talk to you first," she said softly, placing another light kiss on Jane's cheek as Frost and Donna came grumbling back into the room.

"Crazy weather, huh?" Jane said, a little more loudly than was necessary.

"Jane," Frost sighed, "we know you two were making out."

"Detective Frost!" Maura cried, affronted. "We were not _making out_."

"Uh-huh," he said, pulling off his coat. "Whatever you say."

"Hate to break up family time," Donna cut in, "but this crazy weather isn't going to get any better. We need to figure out how we're going to prepare, because the way things are going now we'll have two feet by morning."

They all looked out the window, rendered temporarily breathless by the thick snow beginning to settle across the landscape.

"Wow," Jane whispered.

"No snowball fights," Maura whispered back. "And don't make that face."

* * *

The next morning Jane woke early, just before dawn, and smiled and winced as she carefully pulled her arm from under Maura's still-sleeping form. She slipped out of bed as quietly as she could and padded to the window, sucking in her breath at the sight of the clearing blanketed in a dense white layer of snow. The predawn light gleamed deep purple-blue in the hollows, the spindly tree branches soft and rounded against the gradually-brightening sky. "Wow," she whispered.

"Mmm?" Maura murmured, shifting in the bed. "Jane?"

"Go back to sleep, Maura, I'm just looking at the snow."

"I hope you're wearing a sweater," Maura mumbled sleepily, drawing the blankets more tightly around herself.

"I just got out of bed, why would I be wearing a sweater?"

"Because pneumonia with a cracked rib doesn't sound like my idea of fun." Maura sighed, still half-asleep. Jane took a last look at the snow and crawled back into the bed.

"Yeah, I guess this is okay too," she said, drawing Maura close to her. She smiled at Maura's wordless murmur of pleasure, and closed her eyes again.

She didn't open them until a pounding on the door forced her into sudden awareness.

"Not again," she whispered.

"Jane! Dr. Isles! That thing we talked about?" Donna called, still pounding. "Well, it's happening."

They had discussed their plan in the event that they'd need to evacuate due to crawlers or unwanted attention from the mysterious men who had blown up the hospital. The general consensus had been 'run,' thought Jane hadn't been entirely clear on where they'd run to or how they'd get there. They'd all spent long enough on the verge of fleeing to keep emergency packs nearby, but she realized with a sinking feeling none of them had though to repack for the inevitable change of seasons. She was fairly certain her bag contained two pairs of trousers and a couple of undershirts, but nothing that would keep her warm if she had to be outside in the snow for any length of time. Donna and Frost had brought a couple of coats back with them, though neither fit Jane particularly well, and her boots had sprung a leak.

"Come on, ladies!" Donna shouted. "Crawlers advancing on us from everywhere."

"Jane?" Maura whispered, sitting up, her eyes wide. "Again?"

"Yeah," Jane said. "Come on, time to shoot stuff."

They dressed quickly, wearing as many layers as would allow them freedom of movement. Maura grabbed her rifle from its place next to the bed, snatched a box of cartridges from the pile against the wall. She slung her pack over her shoulder and caught Jane's arm before she flew out of the room.

"Jane," she said urgently. "Please."

Jane nodded. "You too."

"I'll always come back, Jane," Maura said, trying to smile though her voice was deadly serious. "Even if I'm just going across the room."

Jane looked at her briefly, her eyes expressing more than either of them could comprehend in that fleeting moment before Donna burst in.

"Let's go," she said, throwing Jane a sleek automatic rifle.

"Baby," Jane whispered, running her fingers across the barrel. "Where'd this come from?"

"You don't bring a cap gun to a zombie fight, Jane," Donna said. "Now let's move."

They met Frost in the living room, checking the clips for several pistols. "You sure you don't want one of these?" Jane asked, raising her M16.

"I'm good," he said. "I like to know what I'm shooting at."

"Yeah, me too," Jane said, "I just like to know I've shot it."

"Yeah, well-"

"Two hundred crawlers, you guys," Donna reminded them. "Right outside, dying to say hello."

They moved to the windows, Jane and Frost taking the south side in the kitchen, Donna and Maura covering the north.

"My God," Maura whispered, horrified.

Crawlers were pouring into the clearing, their thick bruised bodies undeterred by the cold. They moved more slowly than usual, working to navigate the deep drifts at the edge of the clearing, but they showed no signs of stopping.

"All right!" Donna shouted. "Open fire!"

The deafening blasts of gunfire filled the tranquil clearing; smoke mixed with gently falling snow, the heretofore-undisturbed blanket of white stained a dull, thick red as crawlers dropped one by one.

"Frost!" Jane yelled above the din. "Can you reach more ammo?"

"Hold on!" he yelled back, disappearing into the bedroom for a moment. He emerged with several shiny white boxes balanced in his arms. "Merry Christmas," he muttered, dumping half of them next to where Maura was crouched at the window, bringing the rest to Jane.

"These the right ones?" she breathed. Frost just shook his head at her, and continued firing out the window.

"Okay!" Donna shouted. "We're gonna have to get serious. Dr. Isles, would you hand me that crowbar? Without stopping shooting, as best you can."

Maura nodded, keeping her body curled around her rifle. She shifted slightly to brace herself on the windowsill, then reached out with her left hand for the crowbar leaning against the broken radiator nearby. Without missing a shot, she snatched it and slid it across the floor to Donna.

"She's good, this one," Donna shouted to Jane and Frost. "You ever thought about working for State?"

"About as much as I'd thought about being in a shitbox in the middle of nowhere shooting at the undead," Maura muttered, squeezing off another round.

"We could use a smart woman like you," Donna grinned, yanking the crowbar off the ground and striding to a small closet, almost obscured behind the refrigerator. She shoved the appliance aside and jammed the tooth of the crowbar into the doorjamb, wrenching it open with a squeal that could be heard even above the blasts.

"New plan!" she shouted. "Jane! Frost! Get over here!"

Jane and Frost got off a few more shots before darting over to the newly-opened closet.

"Holy shit," Frost muttered.

"One for you," Donna said, pulling a heavy metal rod and cumbersome case from the closet and handing it to Frost, "and one for you." She pulled another out and handed it to Jane.

"Flamethrowers," Jane breathed. "Sweet."

"When is this from, 1945?"

"1964, actually," Donna said. "They've been discontinued by the US military but all that means is they're cheap. They still work, so be careful."

"Wait," Maura cried. "You're sending them out there? _Outside_? With all of those _things _still everywhere?"

"I need you in here, you're better with a kill shot. Sorry Jane, no offense, but she is."

"Hey," Jane said, hefting the tank onto her shoulders. "I get to go roast some crawlers, it's a fair trade."

"Break up," Donna said. "Frost, you go south. Jane, you go around the western side of the house and take the north. Just let 'em rip, you'll scare 'em back and hopefully take out a couple."

"A _couple?_ Come on, you zombie fucks, let's get cozy." Jane grinned. "How do I work this thing?"

"Yeah," Frost said, less enthusiastically. "I'd prefer not to set _myself_ on fire."

"Wildly overrated," Donna said, pushing them toward the door. "I'm just gonna release the fuel—" she twisted a knob on the side of the tank—"and you just point and shoot."

"But—"

"Go!" Donna cried, shoving them onto the porch. "Don't stop until they stop!"

"Jane!" Maura shouted as they were pushed outside. "Jane, be careful!"

"I will!" Jane shouted back.

"Everybody loves everybody, just fucking _go!" _Donna grabbed her rifle and took over at the kitchen window. "Keep shooting, Dr. Isles. You're covering her ass now."

Maura turned back to her rifle sight, focusing the world down to the tiny circle captured in the crosshairs. She breathed slowly, evenly, trying to turn down the volume of everything around her. She caught a flash of Jane's dark hair against the brightness of the snow and felt her heart skip a beat.

_You're covering her ass now_.

She took a deep breath and scanned Jane's immediate vicinity, dropping three crawlers in seconds. Jane turned briefly to the window and winked. She swung back around, letting off the first blast of fire from her flamethrower.

The crawlers shied back, scrabbling in the deep snow. Jane cackled as the first of the bodies shuddered to a smoking halt, and Maura smiled just long enough to let another get within five paces of Jane before she swore under her breath and fired a bullet straight through what remained of its ear.

"Nice, Maura!" Jane yelled, though Maura could just barely hear her over the roar of the flamethrower. She grinned.

"West! West!" Donna shouted suddenly, leaning out the kitchen window. "Frost! Behind you!"

Maura couldn't focus on anything other than keeping Jane safe; felt a flash of relief at the knowledge that this was indeed her only duty in the moment. She kept her eyes and ears trained on Jane's location.

She didn't notice when Donna crept up behind her and pressed a cloth to her nose and mouth.

Maura moaned softly before slumping to the floor, her rifle teetering for a moment on the windowsill before tumbling down next to her.

* * *

Jane let another burst of flame erupt from her weapon, whooping as the crawlers tried to fall back but were consumed by the fire, falling into oily heaps, the snow melting away from them so rapidly it was as though it had never fallen.

"Frost, this is fucking great! I'm gonna get me one of these for barbecues!"

She waited for Frost's response.

Nothing.

She turned her head slightly, letting a steady stream of flame cover her as she looked around for him.

Nothing.

She turned slightly more and gasped when she saw fire licking up the walls of the house.

"Maura!" she shouted, bolting back to the structure. She skidded to a halt a few feet away, the fire already oppressively hot, smoke already choking her. She managed to see in the windows, saw Donna kneeling over Maura's prone body.

"Oh God," she whispered as Frost came careening around the side of the house.

"Jane, what the hell happened?"

"I don't know! I don't know! We have to get her out of there, Frost, we _have_ to!"

"Jane, Donna's in there, she'll get her out, okay? _We_ have to stop these ugly bastards from getting any closer, yeah?" He started to move back out into the clearing and stopped when Jane didn't follow. "Jane!" he shouted. "We have to go! Now! Donna will take care of her!"

_I'll always come back to you._

Jane allowed herself to be dragged by the arm away from the house, forced herself to focus on driving back the onslaught.

_Donna will get her out. Donna will make sure she's safe_.

Jane forced herself to pay attention to the small battle she and Frost were waging, forced herself to push closer toward the woods, forced herself to ignore the stench of cooked, rotting flesh as she took out as many crawlers as she could.

Finally the last of them fell. "One more sweep!" Jane called, pointing south. Frost nodded and they ran as quickly as they could around the perimeter of the clearing, hoses at the ready.

Jane wasn't entirely sure what happened next.

She heard the heavy groan and crack of the support beams being eaten by flame and crashing in on themselves, felt her heart being wrenched from its chest, felt her breath turn to ice in her lungs. "Maura," she whispered.

"I saw Donna carrying her out," Frost panted, grabbing her arm to keep her from running into the still-burning structure. "She's out, Jane."

"Where is she?" Jane demanded, running back toward the porch.

"Jane!" Frost shouted, pointing in the direction of the road they'd come from a week before. "Listen!"

It took everything she had to make herself still enough to be able to hear the faint clanking chug of an old engine revving to life. "Is that Donna? Did she have a car this whole goddamned time?"

They bolted for the far side of the clearing, scrambling up the short, steep hillside. Jane didn't notice the searing pain in her ribs as they made it up to the road just in time to see Donna come roaring out of a small hollow between two trees, her light truck grinding over the brush she'd used to hide it. Maura was in the passenger seat, her eyes closed, head lolling as the truck swerved onto the road.

"Maura!" Jane screamed, her voice ragged.

"Jane, get down!" Frost shouted, just as Jane saw Donna lift her arm, saw the tiny dull black circle that signified the end of everything.

A sharp crack ricocheted through the crisp white dawn.

A brilliant scarlet flower bloomed in the snow.

_How pretty_, Jane thought, before her eyes slid closed.

* * *

A/N: Uh


	14. The River Acheron

Maura's head was pounding.

She could smell the oily, sharp breath of gasoline. The metallic bitterness of cold air. She felt her head bump against something hard and smooth.

_The window_.

She blinked groggily, wincing as the bright, thin winter light pierced her eyes. She raised her hand to her head.

"What-"

"Hold on, Doctor," Donna said, wrenching on the steering wheel. "It's about to get bumpy."

The truck slammed over fallen branches, jolting Maura into full awareness. She blinked again, pressing at her throbbing temple with the heel of her hand. "Agent Ellison, what are you doing? Where's Jane? Where's Frost?"

"They couldn't make it," Donna said, her voice impossible to read.

"What are you talking about? Where's Jane?" Maura demanded, nearly shouting though it caused her head to ache. She felt sick, though she didn't know if it was because of the smell of gasoline, the lurching truck, whatever Donna had used to incapacitate her. _Halothane. From the hospital._ Maura estimated she'd been unconscious for at least an hour, given that the sun was already hanging well above the horizon.

"Where's Jane?" she shouted again. Donna remained blank. Maura stared at her for a moment, beyond fury, then flicked her head toward her window. She watched the landscape whip by. She glanced at the odometer and frowned; they were going much too fast for her to survive a leap from the vehicle.

Donna noticed her checking the speed. "I wouldn't try it," she said. "It's nothing but empty roads for miles, and I don't plan on slowing down."

"Where's Jane?" She stared at Donna, her face hard. She grasped the door handle. "I'll do it if you don't tell me."

Donna pressed on the gas, but glanced at Maura with what seemed to be worry.

Maura pulled.

"Don't!" Donna shouted, flinging her arm out and hooking it around Maura's waist. "Shut the goddamned door!"

"Where's Jane?"

"She's alive! When I left her she was alive."

"Is she hurt?"

Donna didn't answer. Maura struggled against her, working toward the open passenger door.

"Is she _hurt?"_

Maura didn't register the icy air whipping past her. She didn't register the terrifying speed at which they were traveling, the way the trees flew by in a blur. She only saw Donna's face, one she'd always found strangely unmemorable, but at that moment her eyes betrayed her as they blazed with anger and fear.

"No!" Donna cried. "No, she's not hurt."

"Are you lying?" Maura watched her intently, the whole of her focus directed at Donna's face.

"She'll live," Donna muttered, jerking hard at Maura's waist. Maura fell sideways across the seat as Donna simultaneously pulled the truck hard to the left, the door slamming shut. She released Maura and slammed the lock down in one motion, then brought the truck to a halt, fishtailing across the snow-covered road. Before Maura could act, Donna grabbed both of her wrists with one hand, squeezing them together with an iron grip.

"Please don't do that again, Doctor," she said evenly, fishing under her seat with her free hand and pulling out a roll of duct tape. She found the edge and pinned the roll between her knees, tugging on it until she could attach it to Maura's wrists, wrapping them tightly. "If you keep still I won't have to tape your arms and legs," Donna said, looking straight at her. "And if you keep quiet I won't have to tape your mouth. Do you understand?"

Maura turned away, stared straight ahead out the window. The snow continued to fall, though the reedy winter light still seared her brain. She didn't speak.

"Do you understand, Dr. Isles?"

"Yes," Maura spat. She clenched her jaw. She stared straight ahead.

"Would you like to know where we're going?" Donna asked after a few icily quiet moments.

Maura didn't speak.

"I'm sure you're curious. That's part of why we picked you."

"_We?_" Maura said before she could stop herself.

"As I'm sure you've noticed," Donna said, throwing the truck into gear and pulling them back around on the road, "doctors are in short supply. And as I'm sure Detective Frost told you, female doctors are an especially valuable commodity these days."

"You want me to be your _doctor_? You want me to be the _physician _to the people who did _this_? To keep them _healthy_?" She couldn't begin to fathom the depths of her own rage. "Are you _insane_?"

"We'll keep you alive, Dr. Isles. Hot showers, hot meals, nearly everything you were accustomed to before."

"Oh, well, of course, then," she said bitterly. "And I suppose the disgust is just an extra perk."

"I see Detective Rizzoli has been rubbing off on you even more than I thought," Donna said, smirking slightly.

Maura felt a hot flush of anger swell in her. She wrenched around and spat at Donna. "Don't you dare," she growled. "Don't you _dare_ talk about her."

"All right," Donna shrugged, ignoring Maura's outburst. "I won't."

Maura resumed staring out the window. "If you think for a _minute_ that I'm going to help you," she said, her voice low and poisonous, "you should probably tape my arms and legs and throw me out of the truck yourself."

"Don't think I won't, Doctor."

Maura heard the cold honesty in Donna's voice. She shivered.

_This woman is a killer_.

"What would it take?" Donna asked after another few silent minutes.

"You don't have what it would take."

_You murdered what it would take_.

Donna drummed her fingers on the steering wheel. "I'll get you Jane," she said suddenly, as though she hadn't meant for the words to come out.

Maura glanced sharply at her.

"Go on."

"It would only take a phone call." She indicated the bulky metal box crowding Maura's feet. "Satellite. Crawlers can't make it to space."

Maura bit her lip. She frowned. She though hard about what it would mean if she accepted Donna's offer.

"How can I trust you?"

"I'll do it right now," she said, reaching down for the box. Her hand brushed Maura's leg. Maura shuddered, pulled away.

"But how can I _trust_ you?"

"I don't get the impression that you can or will."

"Then I don't understand how we're going to come to a compromise."

"I'm taking you to meet them, Doctor. We're already on our way. If we get there and you won't help, well, they're not the sort of people to offer any incentive."

"Not even for my skills as a physician?"

"You're a medical examiner, Dr. Isles. I mean no disrespect to your training, and you've proven yourself an able physician and fighter, but my coming across you was happenstance."

"Happenstance?" Maura sneered. "How convenient it was for everyone."

"I saw an opportunity," Donna shrugged, "I took it. That's how you stay alive."

"Is that all this is about for you?" Maura whispered after a beat. "Staying alive?"

"What else is there?" Donna replied. "Life or death is the only option."

"But what kind of life is this?"

Donna said nothing. She pressed down on the gas.

* * *

"Jane!"

She was far away, standing on first base, waiting for the pitch.

"Jane!"

The sweet scent of freshly-cut grass filled her nose, mixed with the richness of dirt, the sharp alkalinity of line chalk.

"Jane! Wake up!"

The sun beat down on her shoulders. The pitcher nodded to the catcher.

"Jane! Can you hear me?"

A cloud passed over the sun. The soft breeze grew thin and cold.

"Jane!"

"Walk him," she mumbled. "Let's just get going."

"Jane, come on."

She blinked. Groaned.

"That's better," Frost said, his face gradually coming into focus. Snow fluttered down, prickling at her cheeks. Her arm blazed with pain.

"What happened?" she muttered.

"You got shot. Again."

"Is it bad?"

Frost grimaced, lightly gripped her arm. Jane gasped as pain bolted through her.

"Jesus, Frost!"

"Doesn't look too bad," he said, gently lowering her arm again. "Superficial."

"Didn't your mother ever teach you to take a bullet for a lady?"

Frost chuckled. "My mother taught me to get out of the way if someone pulled a gun," he said.

"Some homicide detective you are," she grumbled, gingerly pushing herself up with her good arm. "This hurts like hell."

"I've got a piece of fabric I can use to tie it up with," he said. "Be right back."

He moved to the place where their truck had met its demise, still wrapped around a tree. Fished in the cab for a moment.

"Maura," Jane breathed suddenly. "Frost, she took Maura!" She struggled to a standing position, hissing as she bumped her injured arm against her injured side.

"I know," he said through gritted teeth. "Looked like she drugged her first."

"She never would've gone otherwise," Jane said, frowning, staring at her blood bright as rubies in the snow. "Where do you think they went? Did Donna ever say anything about a place she knew, a safe place? If she'd wanted to just hurt Maura—" the words caught in her throat, but she swallowed hard and pushed on. "—if she'd just wanted to hurt her, she'd have done it and not bothered to take her along."

"She never said anything concrete," Frost said. "Lots of references to safehouses. I'm pretty sure the place we were at was one of 'em."

"Hence the flamethrowers and the machine guns."

"Yeah."

"Well," Jane said, wincing as Frost helped her ease off her too-large coat and bound her bleeding arm. "What do we do now? We've got no transportation, no food, no weapons—"

"Not so fast," Frost grinned. He tied off the fabric and turned back to the truck, holding up a finger to stop Jane's questions. "She told us a lot," he said, digging around behind the bench seat. "But talking a lot doesn't mean you're telling the truth. And Agent Ellison-" he grunted, pulling out a small bundle wrapped in black cloth, "—was one of the least trustworthy people I think I've ever met in my life."

"Why didn't you say anything?" Jane cried.

"Really?"

"Yes, really!"

"She's CIA, Jane, why did you trust her at all?"

"Because she . . . protected us . . ." Jane frowned, glancing at her bandaged arm. "Okay, fine, you win. What were you saying about weapons?"

"I know it's not your precious M16," Frost said, unwrapping his bundle, "but before she got a good look at our supplies I stashed a couple of guns behind the seat. Just in case."

"Frost," Jane breathed, taking the pistol, "you're a genius. Please don't ever trust anybody."

"I trust you, Jane," he said, his voice suddenly serious.

She smiled awkwardly. "Yeah, you know I trust you too."

"Good," he replied, holstering his weapon. "I couldn't store too much ammunition without Donna getting suspicious, and thanks to her kindly burning down the house we're stuck with what we've got, and it's not a lot. So we'll have to be careful."

"When am I ever not careful?" Jane bit her lip as the pistol brushed against her injured side. "She shot my gun arm anyway."

"Jane," Frost said. "We killed a hundred crawlers this morning. If that many came at us at once—"

"Yeah," she muttered. "Let's get going."

They began trudging down the deserted, snow-covered road, blinking away the flakes.

"You see any houses that have anything useful in 'em?" she asked as they passed by a rotted-out barn.

"Maybe. A few miles up."

"Okay."

They walked in silence for a few minutes.

"Jane?"

"Yeah?"

"Donna's not going to hurt her. She wants her for something."

"Yeah."

"You said it yourself."

"I know."

"What do you think it is?"

"I don't know, man," Jane said, shaking her head. "I can't really—I don't really want to think about it."

"Okay," Frost said. He started whistling.

"Cut it out."

"You don't like music?"

"That's not music. It's just noise."

"You whistle something, then."

"I can't carry a tune in a bucket, Frost," Jane laughed. "Don't you remember the UC when we had to work at that stupid family restaurant and learn that stupid birthday song?"

"Oh, you mean 'happy happy birthday, it's your special day'—"

"'Happy happy birthday, we're just here to say, happy birthdayyyyyy.' Yeah. That's the one."

"Hmm," Frost said. "Nope, can't say as I do."

Jane grinned and punched him on the shoulder, wincing. She frowned deeply. "God, this sucks. I can't do anything."

"You're doing something right now," Frost said kindly. "You're gonna find her, Jane."

"_We're_ gonna find her," Jane said, pausing to look at him. "I couldn't do this without you, Frost."

"Yeah, well, you're the only one who gets to kiss her when we do."

Jane blushed scarlet. "Yeah, well, don't you forget it," she mumbled.

"I think it's great," he said.

"Great."

"Yeah. A relief, to be honest with you. All that tension was really fucking up my flow, you know?"

"Fuck you," Jane muttered, leaning down and scooping up a handful of snow, tossing it at Frost.

"That's above my pay grade," he grinned. "But I know someone—"

"I said _fuck you_!" Jane shouted, scooping up more snow and stuffing it down the back of Frost's coat. He laughed.

"She's a hell of a woman, Jane."

"I know," Jane said.

"Too bad about the brain damage. Thinking you're good enough for her, and all. I wonder if it's reversible."

"Oh my God, I'm gonna kill you myself," she cried, launching herself at him, knocking him into a snowdrift.

Frost grabbed a handful of snow and pulled his arm back.

"Maura says you're not allowed to throw snowballs at me 'cause I'll get pneumonia," Jane said, backing away from him. "And unless you've got a shitload of antibiotics in your pocket, neither one of us can really afford that."

"Technicality," Frost muttered, standing and brushing the snow off his clothes. "Hey," he said, "there's the place I was talking about. Donna and I didn't get to it, so there might be some good stuff. A better coat, anyway," he remarked, eyeing Jane's oversized jacket, a bloody hole in the sleeve.

"I kinda like this," she said, turning to model it. "It makes me feel . . ."

"Butch?"

She made a face at him. "I'm not butch," she muttered.

"If you say so," Frost murmured under his breath.

"Fuck you," Jane whispered.

They approached the house as obliquely as possible, knowing they were easy targets as they shuffled through the snowy yard. Frost led the way, pistol drawn. "Let's check the shed," he said quietly. "Maybe there's a car."

Jane nodded, fumbling as she tried to hold her gun in her right hand. They swept around the eastern edge of the house, glancing in the unlit windows as they circled. The late-morning sun illuminated the interior, revealing a house in moderate disarray.

"Dishes on the table," Jane said softly.

"I got it," Frost replied, edging quickly up to the window. "Rotten."

"So good chance there's nobody inside."

"Pretty good."

They made it to the detached garage, and Frost rammed his shoulder into the locked door as quietly as possible. After a few hard shoves the hinges groaned and gave way. They blinked as their eyes adjusted to the dim interior.

"Yes," Jane whispered. "Yes."

Several motorcycles in varying stages of repair stood scattered around the space. Some were up on blocks, their wheels missing, but after a cursory glance Jane spotted three that seemed like likely candidates.

"You ever ridden a motorcycle?" Frost asked skeptically. "In the snow?"

"I've ridden a bicycle," she said. "And an elephant once, at the circus."

"I'm sure it'll be just the same."

"Frost, do you not realize how badass this is?"

"Forgive me," he shook his head, "but I guess I don't."

"You scared?"

"No!" he cried. "Of course I'm not scared."

"Then put your money where your mouth is, Mad Max," Jane grinned, examining a small, slightly rusted black and silver machine. "1968 Triumph Bonneville T120," she breathed. "This one's mine."

"If it works," Frost said skeptically.

"It's gonna work," Jane said, swinging her leg over the seat. "Damn, that's cold." She kicked at the starter a few times, squeezing her eyes shut as it clicked uselessly before sputtering to life. "I told you!" she cried. "Awesome."

Frost shook his head. "Okay," he sighed. "Which one do I get?"

"Try the Harley," she said, pointing to a larger bike propped up near the front of the shed. "The XL. It's heavier. Sturdier. Lower to the ground so it's less wobbly. I mean, if you're a chicken."

"I'm not a chicken!" Frost said. "I just . . . like this one better."

"Uh-huh," Jane chuckled dryly. "Well, it looks like it's been used the most, see how it's parked close to the door?

Frost grimaced and pulled himself onto the motorcycle. "Yeah, it's okay," he said, leaning slightly forward, working the handgrips.

"Well, kick it off, let's do this!"

Frost closed his eyes and kicked hard at the ignition. The engine blatted briefly and then roared up, deafening in the small space.

"Hell yeah!" Jane shouted, revving her own, smaller engine. "We got wheels now, baby, everything's gonna be just fine."

"Sure, you're not butch," Frost muttered.

"What was that?" Jane said, tossing him a look.

"Sorry," he revved his engine, shrugging. "I can't hear you."

Jane extended her middle finger. "Hear that?"

She slowly walked the Triumph backward out of the shed, careful not to bank it in the snow immediately. Frost followed her, and they parked the motorcycles a few feet from the house.

"Let's go in, see what we can get. Then I think we should just keep heading west, don't you?"

"Seems like the way to be going," Frost said. "Agent Ellison did seem pretty sure we'd head west once we got out of Boston."

"Okay," Jane said. "Let's get in there, find anything we can. And I gotta pee pretty bad, Frost, so dibs on the bathroom."

"I understand what Dr. Isles sees in you," he replied dryly.

Jane flipped him off again, then stood by the door, staring expectantly.

"What, you're gonna dis me and then expect me to break down the door for you?"

"Which one of us got shot today?"

He rolled his eyes. "Okay," he sighed. "Stand back." He took a deep breath and slammed his shoulder into the door, grunting as it burst open.

"These houses give me the creeps," Jane said softly as they crept into the entryway. "Guns out."

"Way ahead of you," Frost breathed. He glanced in each room as they passed. "Seems clear," he whispered.

"Yeah, I'll check upstairs, you find what you can down here."

Jane made her way up to the second floor, shivering. She could see her breath hanging in the air, jerked away briefly when she grasped the cold metal doorknob at the top of the stairs.

"Holy shit, Frost," she called. "You're gonna want to see this."

* * *

A/N: Thanks for continuing to read this story! It continues to be marvelous fun to write. Your reviews are like getting a really great Advent calendar, like you see that it's there and you're a little afraid at first that it's going to be some shitty waxy lamb that looks like something you don't even want to talk about in mixed company and then you realize it's like a frigging Guylian seahorse and BAM everything is amazing.

I'd like to eat you all up with my bare hands, is what I'm saying, and you have my full permission to interpret that however you want.

This story is getting way more involved and complex than I had originally imagined, but I think we've probably got like six chapters left? Or something? It's been what . . . eleven days since I started it and oh man, it feels way longer than that. But in the best way. So thank you all again for jumping on board this crazy zombie ship with me! Again, if you have any direct questions please feel free to PM me or ask me on Tumblr (domini-porter); I'm happy to answer. But just in case: I will *not* give you any spoilers, and *yes* I'm going to finish it and *no* I'm not going to kill Jane _or_ Maura. Even though I sort of have the impulse, I'm _not_.


	15. Fighters

"On second thought," Jane said, leaning back down the stairs as Frost made his way up, "you probably don't _want_ to see it. But you should."

"What's up?"

Jane stood aside, holding the door open for Frost.

"Oh shit," he breathed, turning around immediately, his hand flying to his mouth.

"I continue to be astounded by your squeamishness," Jane said, entering the attic room.

Five bodies in advanced stages of decay were clustered in the center of the space, though time and the recent advent of cold weather had mercifully eliminated most of the odor.

"I see . . . two adult males, two adult females, looks like a kid. Jesus, Frost, what the hell happened?"

"Looks deliberate," he said, edging into the room. "Cups on the floor. Probably poisoned themselves."

"So they wouldn't get turned," Jane murmured. "That means there were crawlers here."

"Yeah, or they somehow knew about it before they ran into any."

"But why the attic? Why not the living room or the kitchen or one of the bedrooms?"

"Look," Frost said, pointing to the eastern side of the room. Sunlight streamed in, bouncing off the snow. "They're facing the window."

"Watching the sun come up as they died," Jane murmured. She turned away abruptly.

"You okay, Jane?"

"Yeah, fine," she said stiffly, not looking at him. She blinked back hot tears, surprised at herself for getting so emotional. She'd seen much worse; violent death, rotted corpses, she'd watched a hospital full of women and children bombed into oblivion, but something about the positioning of this group of bodies was more than she could take.

"Jane?"

"I know it's a lot to ask but do you think you could finish checking things out in here? I'll, uh, I'll go back downstairs and see if there's anything we can use."

"Yeah," Frost said, his voice slightly quizzical but filled with understanding all the same. "Yeah, I got this."

"Thanks," Jane called over her shoulder, bolting down the steps as quickly as her damaged body would allow her, waiting until she'd swung around the bottom post and headed into the kitchen before wiping at the tears spilling down her cheeks. She frowned at herself for losing control, even for a moment. _There's so much worse out there, Jane. Crawlers and conspiracies and they have Maura, don't forget they have Maura_.

_But the cups scattered on the floor. The child on one of the laps. They probably had the kid drink first. Oh God._

She shook her head, trying to turn off her sudden emotions. She realized she'd gone weeks without crying, without letting herself feel anything, except when she'd kissed Maura, when she'd done that—

"Jane?" Frost called, moving back down the stairs.

"Yeah, I'm in here," she said, taking a deep breath. "Find anything?"

"Cyanide," he said, holding out an empty glass bottle with a faded label. "Probably for rats."

"And people who didn't want to live like rats," Jane said, wishing she hadn't, as she felt the pressure building behind her eyes again. "Anything else?"

"Army jacket. In a trunk," he added, holding it out to her. "Not . . . on anybody. I thought it might fit you a little better than what you have."

"Conrad," Jane read the name stitched above the breast pocket. "Thanks, Conrad," she whispered, easing out of her too-big coat and slipping the replacement on. "This is great, Frost. Thanks."

"You find anything?"

"Not yet," she said quickly, trying to hide the fact that she'd been working to get a handle on herself. "But looks like there's a mud room or something, maybe there's a couple of backpacks. And all those motorcycles, there has to be a saddlebag somewhere."

They searched the lower floor for a few minutes, turning up a leather saddlebag that would fit Frost's Harley, as well as two hiking packs. Jane scoured the bathroom medicine chest, dumping aspirin, bandages, and antibiotic ointment into her pack.

Frost joined her in the living room. "Found some water bottles, seem pretty sturdy."

"Okay, great," Jane said.

"And some boots, I think they're your size. Gotta love these outdoorsy Western Mass types, huh?"

Jane took the offered boots silently. She didn't mind taking the packs and the aspirin, but something about wearing the boots of one of the people she'd seen in the attic, one of the people who had sacrificed themselves rather than endure the world she found herself living in, made her feel deeply uncomfortable.

"You need 'em, Jane," Frost said softly. "The ones you've got aren't going to last much longer."

He was right, but she didn't want to say anything for fear of crying in front of him. She nodded, sat down on the couch and pulled her cracked and porous shoes off, tossing them aside. "Feels weird to leave something here," she said after a beat.

"Everything feels pretty weird," Frost said. "I guess I thought I'd be used to things by now, but . . ."

"Yeah," Jane said, lacing up the new boots. "I know." She glanced around the room again. "You think we can get that gun safe open?" she asked, indicating a tall metal case near a small end table.

"Probably not," Frost said. "Unless—" he crossed to the safe, turned the handle, grinned when it swung open. "I guess they thought about trying to defend themselves."

"I bet they did," Jane mumbled, working to suppress a rush of sorrow. "Anything?"

"How about this?" Frost asked, holding up a Winchester hunting rifle. "It's no automatic, I know, but I also know how much you like to pose with a rifle."

"It's not _posing_, Frost. It's _shooting the shit out of some bad guys._"

Frost laughed. "Whatever you say." He tossed the rifle to her and she caught it with her good hand. "Plus some shells, open your pack." He dumped several boxes into the bag, then turned back to the safe. "Some usable ammunition for what we've already got," he muttered, clearing off the shelf. "This'll help."

"Anything else?"

Frost shook his head. "Not that I can see."

"Okay," Jane said. "Let's get out of here."

He nodded, slinging his pack over his shoulders. "Oh, wait," he said, disappearing into the mud room again, emerging with two scarves. "I figure it gets pretty cold riding a motorcycle in the snow, and I don't want to have to see your frozen snot," he teased. Jane made a face at him and tied the scarf over her mouth and nose.

"Pretty badass, right?" she said. Frost shook his head, laughing.

"Yeah, pretty badass."

"You too, cowboy," Jane said. "I _really_ don't want to see your frozen snot, especially not sticking to that scruffy thing," she said, indicating Frost's patchy beard and mustache.

"Aw damn," he said, "I was gonna look for a razor."

"Too late," Jane called, heading out the door. "No baby face for you. I guess you'll just have to find some other way to impress the ladies."

Frost grimaced at her and tied the scarf around his face. "Let's do it."

They went back outside. Jane secured the saddlebag to Frost's motorcycle and swung her leg over the Triumph.

"You look good on a bike, Jane," Frost said, a hint of admiration in his voice. "Make sure Maura sees you riding it, you'll get more tail than you know what to do with."

"Frost!" Jane cried. "A little respect, please."

"Begging your pardon, Detective Rizzoli," he said obsequiously. "Forgive me for saying you look hot."

"Ugh," Jane said. "Never say that again." She jammed on the helmet she'd found in the shed, kicked the Triumph's motor over and nodded at him. He put on his own helmet, took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and started his machine.

Snow flew from under the tires as Jane guided the motorcycle carefully out of the drifts onto the road, where the snow was a foot deep but at least it was consistent. She closed her eyes and said a silent prayer as her hands worked the grips, wincing as she agitated her fresh gunshot wound. "Superficial my ass," she muttered, hoping the action of driving the Triumph wouldn't cause the wound to open wider.

She had difficulty maintaining balance in the slick snow, and had to drive much more slowly than she'd hoped. She wanted to find Maura as fast as possible, though a part of her also wanted to open the bike up and go screaming down the highway, just to do it. She realized Frost was probably not as eager to laugh in the face of death and worked on keeping her speed and trajectory steady, giving him a track to follow down the otherwise-pristine ribbon of road.

She glanced in her rearview, saw Frost just on her tail.

_Make sure Maura sees you riding it._

She felt a little excited by the idea of Maura seeing her roaring into whatever place she'd been taken, swooping in on her motorcycle, ready to rescue her.

_She's not a fairy-tale princess, Jane_, she chastised herself. _She's probably giving Donna royal hell right now_.

She smiled at the thought. Six weeks ago she'd have laughed at anyone who told her Maura Isles, with her penchant for stiletto heels and thousand-dollar suit jackets, would be a sharpshooting mercenary with a taste for zombie blood, but here they were, thousands of cartridges later, still alive and fighting.

_She's still alive. She's fighting_.

Jane repeated the words to herself over and over as she drove down the highway, not certain of where she was going but certain of what she was looking for.

* * *

Maura was staring out the window.

Her arms were bound tightly to her sides. Her legs were still free, for the time being, though the tape across her mouth itched. The dried blood around her nose, too, from Donna elbowing her sharply in the face.

Donna hadn't said anything in several hours, not since Maura had moved to grab the gun she'd spied half-sliding out of Donna's coat pocket. She'd known it was risky, but as they got farther and farther away from the house in the clearing she'd felt very distinctly the chances of Jane finding her before they reached their destination slipping away.

_You have to do this, Maura, you just have to act._

She'd tried to reach for the gun subtly, without Donna noticing, but in the confined space of the truck cab very little escaped either of their attentions.

"I asked you to be good, Doctor," Donna had muttered as she wound the duct tape around Maura's upper body, securing her arms to her sides. She'd regarded Maura for a moment, evaluating her coldly, had ripped off another piece of tape and secured it over her mouth, even though Maura hadn't said anything. "Just in case," Donna had said, pressing a little harder than Maura thought was necessary, especially given that Donna had almost certainly broken her nose.

Now Maura was silently cursing herself as she sat propped against the door, unable to move, unable to speak. Donna hadn't looked at her, hadn't acknowledged her, since she'd had to bind her.

Maura felt a small flush of excited pride even as she examined the difficulty of the situation. Jane would be proud of her, she knew, for fighting back. The ache in her nose was almost pleasant, the swelling a perverse badge of honor. Maura would've smiled if it weren't for the tape over her mouth, though she'd subtly been working her jaw, loosening the gag bit by bit.

They'd been driving for hours, past a uniformly white landscape. Maura had no idea where they were; any road signs had been obscured by snow. She estimated they were out of Massachusetts by now; perhaps, given that they'd been heading steadily west, they were in New York or, if they'd also been moving south, northern Pennsylvania.

Maura wondered where Donna was taking her. What sort of men she would meet, for she was certain they were all almost certainly men. How she would be able to see them without seeing Diana's face, and Angela's, and the hazy whisper of Carrie's red hair. How she would be able to care for them without killing them.

_I don't want to be a killer, Jane_, she thought, her brow furrowing. _I never thought I'd be the kind of person who could do something like that, but if I see these men, I will kill them._

She'd never felt so certain of something so ugly in her life.

Maura realized suddenly that the world outside her window was slowing down. She glanced at Donna, who was frowning slightly as they approached a covered wooden bridge.

Maura knew at once what she had to do.

As soon as Donna had slowed the truck enough Maura launched her body across the bench seat, slamming her head and shoulder hard into Donna, praying it was hard enough.

There was a sickening dull crack as Donna's head hit the driver's side window. The truck spun crazily, Maura held her breath as she watched the riverbank swing closer and closer, sighing painfully through her nose as the truck slid to a halt in a deep snowdrift.

She sat for a moment, dizzy but trying to focus. Donna didn't move. There was a small smear of blood on the windshield from her nose and Maura felt a swell of vengeful pride.

_We match_.

She worked quickly, opening and closing her mouth to get the tape off. Once it was loose she wrenched her arms up at the elbow, wincing at the pressure on her upper arms, and bit at the tape binding her wrists, managing to peel back the edge and tear it off. She rubbed at the raw skin for a moment, then contorted herself enough to free the rest of her body. She grabbed for the gun, training it on Donna's temple.

Donna groaned.

"I would've asked you to be good, Agent Ellison," Maura growled, "but you didn't give me the chance."

"What?" Donna muttered, shaking her head, lifting her fingers to the blood flowing freely from her nose. "Dr. Isles—"

"No," Maura said. "You're listening to me now."

There was a long, frigid pause as they stared at each other, Maura keeping the gun pointed squarely at Donna's head. She jumped slightly as an odd, tinny burring noise filled the cab.

"It's them," Donna said, indicating the satellite phone. "I'm supposed to be checking in."

"Let's not keep them waiting," Maura replied. She leaned down and fumbled at the case, managing to open it without dropping her weapon. She lifted the bulky receiver.

"This is Dr. Isles," she said, staring straight into Donna's eyes.


	16. Furies

There was a long silence on the other end of the line.

"Hello?" Maura said, not taking her eyes off Donna for a moment. Donna was staring at her with an expression she couldn't read, but Maura didn't care. She had the gun and the telephone, and wasn't about to relinquish either.

"Dr. Isles," came a deep male voice. "I didn't expect we'd be speaking so soon. Do you have Agent Ellison?"

"Yes."

"Would you put her on the line, please?" The man's voice was soft, almost pleasant, as though hearing Maura on the other end was the most natural thing in the world.

"I'm afraid she can't come to the phone," Maura said with a calmness that almost surprised her. She felt cold all over, adrenaline pumping hard through her body, she was focused intently on holding the gun steady, on the sound of the man's voice.

"Is she incapacitated?"

"She's perfectly fine. The swelling should go down in a day or so, provided she puts ice on the affected area. There's plenty of snow around, so it shouldn't be a problem."

The line was silent and for a moment Maura was gripped with the fear that she'd lost them. Whoever they were, they were her only solid chance of negotiating for Jane and Frost's safety.

_I will kill them, Jane_.

Donna scowled at her, hand still pressed to her bleeding nose. "Bitch," she muttered. Maura's hand darted forward, striking Donna's wounded face with the butt of the pistol. Donna cried out.

"Dr. Isles," the voice came again, smooth as silk. "Please put Agent Ellison on the line."

"I'm so sorry," Maura said. "I'm afraid I can't do that."

Silence.

A soft click and a low whine as the man on the other end terminated the call.

Maura kept the receiver pressed to her ear for a moment before dropping it to the floor.

"We're both dead," Donna muttered, cupping her chin with her other hand to catch the blood freshly spurting from her nose. "We're dead, your friends are dead."

Maura frowned slightly. She felt a deep, cold uncertainty coiling in the pit of her stomach.

_I don't know how to do this, Jane_, she thought. _I don't know how to play these games. _

She suddenly wanted to be anywhere else in the world, back in the house in the clearing, in the crumbling hospital, in her own warm bed. She wanted Jane's arms around her, she wanted Jane to whisper soft words in her ear, she didn't care what they were. She wanted to wake up.

_You're not dreaming, Maura. You have to keep going. You have to do this_.

"Why?" she demanded. "How will they find us? How will they find Jane?"

"_They_ won't need to find Jane," Donna said, grinning coldly, her teeth laced with blood. "The crawlers will take care of her. Or the snow. For all I know she might be dead already. And Frost, which is a shame, because he seemed like a good guy."

It took all the strength Maura had not to pull the trigger in that moment.

Once she realized the impulse she was overcome with a sudden horror, a deep and terrifying wretchedness. She had never felt the desire to kill before; she'd never been able to understand how Jane was able to do it, no matter how monstrous the people she was killing. She'd never let herself believe Jane could _want_ to do it, she'd always told herself that the lives Jane ended came at a terrible price. That they came with any price at all.

The weight of the whole black universe came crashing down around her, she was suddenly suffocated with despair, but she heard Jane's voice in her head, telling her to be strong. Telling her to keep going, that she'd come so far, too far, to stop.

"How will they find _us_?"

Donna said nothing.

"I'll shoot you right here," Maura said, trying to keep the waver out of her voice.

"No you won't," Donna sneered. Her face was relaxing, she began to seem almost cheerful. "You don't have it in you. Why do you think you were so easy to take? It's a good thing Jane was distracted by the crawlers. Now _there's_ a woman to watch out for. If she wasn't so impulsive I'd have brought her along too, if only to keep you quiet, but she's already proven she'd kill for you and that wasn't a risk I was interested in taking."

Maura's face hardened again.

"I don't have to kill you, Agent Ellison," she said. "I'm well aware of the effect of gunshots on every part of the human body. Any of your limbs," she said, the barrel of the gun drifting to Donna's arm, her leg, "or the meat of your shoulder, for example; these would be extraordinarily painful, though you'd likely survive. Long enough for the crawlers, anyway. Or the snow."

She felt a faint rush of relief when she saw fear creep into Donna's eyes. _Keep going, Maura_, Jane's voice whispered in her ear. _Just keep her afraid, you can do this_.

"Do it then," Donna whispered, though Maura could hear the uncertainty in her voice.

"You've sacrificed hundreds, _thousands_ of innocent people to save your own life," Maura said, keeping her voice as even as she could. "But you're inviting me to shoot you and let you die slowly, painfully, alone, and with nothing to show for any of it. That doesn't seem very logical."

"I told you we're dead already," Donna muttered. "Your little stunt, that sealed the deal."

"_How?"_ Maura demanded.

Donna gazed out the window, staring at the small river they'd nearly crashed into.

"There's a tracking device," she said finally. "They'll be here by nightfall."

"Where is it?"

Nothing.

"Where _is_ it?" she shouted, swiftly pointing the gun at Donna's right thigh. "In some situations a shattered femur can't even be dragged behind the body, Agent Ellison. If the shot is high enough and at close enough range the damage will be too extensive and the pain too great for you to even _crawl_, though death from the wound itself is highly unlikely. Now," she said again, her gun hand shaking slightly, "where is it?"

Donna glanced down at the satellite phone.

"Hands behind your back," Maura said sharply, feeling a faint twinge of comfort as she heard Jane's words coming out of her mouth. "Don't try anything. _Do _it!" she barked as Donna hesitated, then grimaced and pulled her hands away from her face, blood pouring down her chin. She left her hands curled in her lap. "I asked you to put your hands behind your back, Agent Ellison," Maura said softly. "Please don't make me ask you again."

Slowly, Donna leaned forward and clasped her hands behind her back. Maura grabbed the roll of duct tape with her free hand, clamping it between her knees to loosen the edge. She pushed Donna up against the driver's side door, facing away, and quickly bound her wrists with tape. As soon as she was certain Donna wouldn't be able to grab the gun she set it down to her right and ripped off another piece of tape, pressing it roughly to Donna's mouth. "Just in case," she whispered. Rage blazed in Donna's eyes. "Now," she said, reaching across Donna's body, repressing a shudder of revulsion as she brushed against her to open the door, "get out."

Donna struggled into the snowdrift, blood blooming brightly as droplets fell from her broken nose. Maura picked up the gun and case and slid out after her. "To the river," she said.

Donna made her way slowly to the bank, stumbling as she tried to keep her balance. Maura followed closely behind, aiming the pistol at her back. Once they reached the edge of the frigid water Maura heaved the case in, watching it sink beneath the rippling surface. "Passenger side," she said. "Go."

They worked their way back to the truck. Once Donna had wrestled herself into the seat Maura grabbed the duct tape and bound her arms and legs, praying she wouldn't lose her nerve, holding on to Jane's voice still whispering in her ear. _You can do this, Maura. You have to_.

She eyed Donna, bound tightly in her seat, still staring at her. She realized she'd have to put the gun down at some point, and grabbed the duct tape from where she'd dropped it on the floor, tearing off a long strip and taping Donna's prone body to the seat as tightly as she could. She buckled the seatbelt around her, then wound another strip of tape between Donna's arms and the shoulder strap, securing her as best she could. When Maura felt confident Donna wouldn't be able to move she slammed the door and crossed around the front of the truck to the driver's side, hoping with every fiber of her being that the vehicle would start.

She slid into the seat and turned the key, her heart beating wildly as the engine tried to turn over for several moments until rumbling to life.

Maura pushed down the intense urge to cry as she threw the truck into gear, pressing hard on the gas until the vehicle ground out of the deep snow and lurched back onto the road.

"Jane will be so happy to see you," she said, turning east. "I'm sure you'll have a lot to discuss."

As soon as the words were out of her mouth she felt a staggering weariness sweep over her, as though whatever brittle thing had kept her strong had suddenly fractured into dust. Her nose ached. Her hand ached from gripping the pistol. Her arms ached from being bound so tightly. Her head ached from the halothane. She wanted to throw up from fear and shock and the renewed realization that she had, only moments before, been ready to kill Donna, had been ready to pull the trigger.

_Jane_, she thought desperately, _Jane, I need you, please be all right. I'm coming for you, I'm on my way._

She guided the truck into the ruts it had made not long before, grateful the snow had stopped falling.

_I'll always come back, Jane. Even if I'm just going across the room. I'll always come back._

* * *

Jane blinked hard as the icy air streamed against her face. Tears collected in her eyes from the velocity, but at least it had stopped snowing.

She glanced in her rearview mirror, saw Frost still close behind her. He seemed to be a little more relaxed on his motorcycle, she thought, though it might've been her slightly blurred vision.

They'd been riding for hours, though it felt like days. Jane's arm burned, which she resented more than she'd ever resented anything, especially when she grimaced into the wind and felt the frozen tears cracking on her cheeks. She was grateful for the scarf Frost had given her, and the jacket, and even the boots, though to think about the boots was to think about the woman they'd come from, her desiccated remains positioned toward the sunrise, her child in her lap—

_You don't know that it was her kid. You don't even know that these were her boots. Focus, Jane. Think about Maura. Think about what you're doing right now._

She smiled despite the pain in her arm, the harsh wind rasping across her face.

_Maura._

She allowed herself to think about the sweetness of Maura's limbs tangled with hers, the impossible softness of her breath as she slept, the warmth of her body, the dizzying nearness of her. She was so wrapped up in her thoughts she almost didn't notice when Frost pulled up next to her, waving at her to stop.

She pulled to a halt, cutting the engine.

"What's up?"

"It's getting dark," he said.

"Yeah," Jane replied, "I can see that."

"Jane," Frost said, slightly impatient. "We have to find somewhere to spend the night."

"I'm not stopping until I find her," Jane said, shrugging.

"You don't even know where you're going," he pointed out. "And it's gonna be dark soon, and cold, and if it starts snowing again who's to say we'd even manage to stay on the road?"

Jane scowled. She knew Frost was right, but the thought of stopping made her almost angry. Her arm ached and she was bitterly cold, but she wanted only to keep moving until she found Maura, until she knew Maura was safe.

"Well, where are we gonna stay? Where _are_ we?"

"I think we're running parallel to the 90. New York by now, probably."

"Great," Jane sighed. She looked off into the distance for a moment. "Have you even seen any buildings?"

"Not for a while," Frost admitted. "But we gotta find somewhere to stay, Jane, we're not safe out here."

"I know," she snapped. "Do you think Maura's safe wherever she is?"

"Look, Jane," he said sharply. "I know you're worried about her. I _get_ it. I don't mean to disrespect your feelings 'cause Lord knows you don't have 'em very often, but I'm here too, all right? I've been following your scrawny zombie-blasting ass around for a long time, and I know I wouldn't be here right now if it wasn't for you, but I need you to recognize that _you _wouldn't be here right now if it wasn't for _me_." He pulled the scarf away from his mouth. "And Dr. Isles isn't the only one who gets to stay alive."

Jane blinked, shocked. Frost had never raised his voice at her and she felt an immediate rush of shame and anger. He stared darkly at her for a moment as she tried to think of something to say, then suddenly softened.

"Jane," he said putting his hand on her uninjured shoulder, "I understand how you feel. I do. Okay? You two have something special, I get it and I get why you want to keep going, but we _can't_ right now. You just have to keep telling yourself that she's okay. You gotta keep believing it. But you also gotta sleep. Actually," he grinned suddenly, "you can do whatever the hell you want, but _I_ need to sleep, and if you ride off in the middle of the night I'm not gonna go save your sorry ass. Again."

She bit her lip and glanced away, grateful her eyes were already red and watery. "Sorry," she muttered. "I know. I'm sorry, Frost. Yeah, let's find a place to spend the night. Maybe they'll have beer," she said, offering a faint smile.

"And a hot shower."

"And a cheeseburger."

"And a ballgame."

Jane smiled genuinely. "So what the hell are we waiting for?"

Frost tucked his scarf around his face again. "I'm waiting for you," he said, starting his motorcycle and departing in a blast of snow.

"My ass isn't scrawny _or_ sorry," she muttered, kicking the Triumph on and speeding after him.

It was nearly dark before Frost waved his arm at Jane, pointing off the road to the right. A hulking structure stood, crusted with frozen snow, a few yards down a slight slope. They turned down what appeared to be a driveway and rolled up to the silo door.

"This isn't freaky at all," Jane muttered, sliding off her bike and pulling off her helmet. "So cozy, too," she said, kicking at the corrugated steel siding, sending a rush of snow tumbling off the roof. Frost glared at her as he brushed the powder off his coat.

"It's the best we're gonna do," he said, wrenching at the frozen door. It opened with a crack and a squeal, revealing a cramped, low-ceilinged concrete room. "Looks like there's room for us and the bikes, I don't want to leave them outside."

"Yeah, it'd be a shame if they caught cold," Jane grumbled, wheeling the Triumph into the dim space. "This place is freezing."

"Looks like it's gonna be body heat," Frost smirked.

"Ugh," she muttered, kicking at a bulging burlap sack. "Are you _sure_ you want to survive the night?"

He rolled his eyes. "Don't think I'm happy about this. I'm gonna close my eyes and imagine you're . . . well, anybody but you."

"Such a gentleman," she muttered as she lowered herself next to the lumpy grain sacks. "Hey, at least there's pillows."

He sighed and settled next to her.

"Goodnight, Rizzoli."

"Goodnight, John-Boy. Ow!" she cried as Frost kicked her in the ankle. "Jerk."

"Oh yeah," Frost mumbled. "_I'm_ the jerk."

* * *

Jane was nearly asleep when Frost shook her arm. "What—"

"Shh," he hissed. "Listen."

She strained her ears against the frigid silence of the night. Faintly she began to hear a faint, distant rumble.

"Car?"

"Doesn't sound like a plane."

They sat, barely breathing, as the sound drew closer.

"Definitely a car," Jane whispered.

The rumbling intensified until it sounded as though it were upon them, then began to fade. She glanced at Frost, still not moving.

"Do you think—" she whispered, cutting herself off when she heard the vehicle moving closer again, reversing back toward the silo.

Jane saw a faint beam of light shining in through the seam in the door.

"Frost," she gasped, grabbing for her pistol.

The engine ground to a halt just outside the building. Jane and Frost remained absolutely motionless as the car door opened and slammed shut, the sound of footsteps breaking through the frozen crust on the snow.

The footsteps stopped at the door. There was an excruciatingly long silence before the corrugated steel rattled, squealed, light streaming in from the vehicle parked just outside.

Jane blinked against the abrupt brightness, holding her arm to her face, unable to see anything other than an indistinct form standing in the doorway.

"What an odd choice of accommodations," Maura said. "I personally would've picked the farmhouse on the other side of the road."

"Maura," Jane breathed, nearly falling backward with shock. "You're—what happened to your face?"

"What happened to your arm?"

Jane glanced down and saw a dark red spot leaching through the fabric of her coat. "It's nothing," she said. "Oh God, Maura," she cried suddenly, leaping up and rushing to her, crushing her in an embrace. "You're okay," she mumbled into Maura's hair, kissing her temple, her cheeks—

"Ow," Maura said softly.

"Oh God, I'm sorry," Jane cried. "What _happened?_"

"It's quite a thrilling story, actually," Maura said, smiling. "But it's long, and charming as the idea of shabby chic can be, I think it would be advisable to spend the night in a place with insulation."

"Is there really a farmhouse across the road?" Jane asked, not releasing her. Maura nodded. "Frost!" she groaned, looking at him. He shrugged.

"It was dark!"

"You couldn't have looked in the other direction? Not even a little bit? You were going to make me _spoon_ with you?"

"Oh my," Maura said, blinking. "That sounds like a pretty thrilling story too."

"I was pretending she was Halle Berry," Frost said by way of explanation.

"Well," Maura said, "let's go. I've got Donna in the truck, but I don't want to leave her alone for too long."

"You've got Donna in the truck?" Jane asked, peering into the headlights. Maura shrugged. "Nicely done, Dr. Isles," Jane grinned. "See, I knew hanging around me would come in handy someday."

Maura smiled sweetly. "Very," she whispered.

"Okay, okay," Frost jumped up. "Okay, let's go find a place where you two can get a room."

Jane glared at him. He chuckled, picked up his scarf. "We can leave the bikes here overnight," he said, patting the seat of his Harley with what looked to Jane like affection.

"Oh my," Maura said, noticing the motorcycles. "Is that a Triumph Bonneville? It looks like . . . 1968?"

Frost gave Jane a meaningful look and she glared at him again.

"I'll give you the full tour in the morning," Jane said, escorting Maura out the door. "Front or back?"

"Back, I'm afraid," Maura replied. "Donna's . . . well, she's not going anywhere. But the house isn't far, see?" she pointed across the road to where a large frame farmhouse stood, clearly visible even in the dark.

"Asshole," Jane muttered again as Frost jumped in the bed of the truck.

"You would've loved it," he muttered back.

"No fighting, you two!" Maura called as she swung into the driver's seat. "It's been a long day."


	17. Orpheus Descending

The farmhouse had proven useful beyond its insulation; Jane punched Frost again when they discovered the woodstove and stack of large metal buckets.

"I get the first hot water," she muttered, "and _you_ get to fill the buckets with snow."

"I'll help you, Detective Frost," Maura chirped, unbelievably cheerful despite her injured nose. "Jane's injuries suggest she shouldn't be doing any intense activity anyway."

"Yeah Jane," Frost whispered as he carried his bucket out the door. "No intense activity." Jane swatted at him, wincing when she pulled at both the gunshot wound on her arm and the still-painful ribs.

Donna kicked at the inside of the closet door where they'd locked her while they checked the house and settled in. Maura had sliced through the tape securing her legs with a large switchblade she'd found in the glovebox of the truck but left her arms and mouth secured, freeing her just enough so that they didn't have to carry her inside. Nobody spoke to her, and she didn't look as though she had any interest in speaking to any of them, so they shoved her in a coat closet, after Jane and Frost found new, sturdier coats, and left her there to fume.

"This reminds me of _Little House on the Prairie_," Maura said half-excitedly as they hauled buckets of hot water into the lower-level bathroom, dumping them in the tub.

"Yeah," Jane said, her arms filled with towels raided from a linen closet, "maybe later we can churn some butter and dip candles. And you should talk to Frost about that, he _loves_ that stuff."

"Really? Detective Frost?" Maura's voice was tinged with curious interest. "I never would've guessed."

"We've learned a lot about each other out on the open road," Jane said, shrugging manfully as she bumped against the doorframe with her injured arm. "Speaking of open roads, how'd you find us, anyway?"

"It stopped snowing," Maura said, "so it was easy. I just followed our tracks back the way they came and hoped you'd stayed on the same road. And you're not always willfully contrarian, much as you hate to admit it—"

"Yes I am," Jane muttered, dropping the towels next to the bathtub nearly filled with steaming water.

"—and while I almost missed your tracks since I wasn't expecting you to take refuge in a silo—"

"Thank Frost for that one," she grumbled, trying to peel off the army jacket, wincing as it stuck to her wounded arm.

"Let me," Maura said softly, dipping a washcloth into the bathtub and pressing it to the bloody sleeve. Jane gasped faintly at the heat, then smiled as the jacket slid off. "Oh dear," Maura clucked. "Did Detective Frost do this? I mean," she said hastily, "he did a perfectly fine job, given what I'm sure were extremely limited circumstances. But let's clean and redress it, all right?" She began unbuttoning Jane's shirt, pressing gently at her injured ribs. "How does that feel?"

"Like, pain-wise or you're-alive wise?" Jane grinned. "'Cause it hurts like hell but you're standing here doing it, so it feels fine to me."

Maura blushed and glanced down at the floor. "You'd be very impressed, Jane," she said.

"No shit," Jane replied. "I'm already impressed and you haven't even told me half of it. But how's your face," she said suddenly, reaching up and grasping Maura's chin lightly between her thumb and forefinger.

"I reset it myself," Maura admitted, "and I think I managed to do it successfully, but I'm worried it'll heal with a bump."

Jane laughed out loud, startling Maura. "What? What did I say?"

"We've come all this way—I've been shot—again—and you got beat up by the CIA and that's just _today_ and you're worried about your face not being perfectly symmetrical."

"It was never _perfectly_ symmetrical, Jane, one side of my mouth lifts slightly higher than-"

"You're perfect," Jane said, kissing her gently. Maura blushed again.

"You'll still love me with a crooked nose?"

"I'll still love you if your nose falls off like the Sphinx," Jane said, feeling a hot flush spread through her body. She realized she'd never said the words to Maura before, and a quick glance at Maura let her know that it hadn't escaped Maura's notice either.

"Be careful what you wish for," Maura whispered, blushing deeply.

"Maura," Jane said, swallowing and taking Maura's hand in hers, the other still holding Maura's chin. "Um," she blinked, suddenly more anxious than she'd ever been, even when firebombing a field full of the undead. "I love you, Maura," she said finally, in a rush. "Like, a _lot_."

Maura smiled so brilliantly Jane thought her own heart would leap out of her chest. "I love you too, Jane," she murmured. She raised herself up on her toes and kissed Jane sweetly, then dropped back to the floor, pressing her lips to Jane's fingers entwined with her own. "Now, you get undressed and get in the tub before it gets cold, I'm going to take this back down to Detective Frost so he can have hot water too." She picked up the oversize bucket. "And be careful with the bandages," she called over her shoulder just as Jane was about to start yanking at whatever end of fabric she could find. "On second though," Maura paused in the doorway, "why don't you just wait for me to get back and I'll take care of those."

"Okay," Jane mumbled bashfully. As soon as Maura was out of the room she put her hand on the countertop to steady herself. Even though it had been several days since things had changed between them, Jane's injuries had made it imprudent—despite her silent objections—to engage in, as Maura called it, _intense activity_. She hadn't even taken her clothes off in front of Maura, not since she'd kissed her, and the thought of it made her extraordinarily nervous.

_Don't be an idiot. You've got cracked ribs and a gunshot wound, and some State bitch elbowed her in the face because she was being too much of a badass to handle. You've got bigger things to worry about than whether or not she likes your body._

Jane sighed and shook her head, carefully pulling her undershirt over her head, gasping as the action agitated her wounds. She kicked her boots off, and peeled off her filthy socks. Weeks of washing in ponds and rainwater had kept them from getting to disgusting to wear, but she found herself idly dreaming of a new pair of thick wool stockings that went all the way to the knee.

She had just slid her trousers down her hips when Maura knocked at the door again. "Uh, just a second," Jane called, bolting into the bathtub, facing away from the door. "Okay."

She thought she heard Maura chuckle as she came into the room. "How is it?"

"It's . . . it's amazing," Jane admitted. "I want to go back and tell my six-year-old self to never ever fight taking a bath again."

"Let me help you," Maura said softly, moving behind her. Jane shivered as she felt Maura's fingers working at the bandage on her arm, then shivered again as she glanced down at the still-open wound.

"Gross," she muttered.

"That's why you always bring an extra bowl of water," Maura said, rinsing her washcloth and raising it to Jane's arm, pressing gently on the wound. "I'm sorry if it hurts," she murmured, squeezing the bloody cloth out in the bowl she'd placed next to the tub.

"Naw, it's all right," Jane said, glad she was facing away. "What's Frost doing?"

"Boiling water," Maura said. "Trying to resist the temptation to shoot Donna, I think."

"Well, as long as he doesn't kill her he can do whatever he wants," Jane muttered. Maura frowned, glad Jane was facing away from her.

"He's very brave," Maura said, continuing to clean Jane's wounded arm. "You know, we probably wouldn't be here if it wasn't for him."

"I know," Jane said softly. "I just want to make sure we end up in a world that's good for him too, you know?" She sighed and drew her knees up out of the water, resting her chin on them. "I don't know, Maura, I feel like I dragged him into all of this, and what does he get?"

Maura dipped her washcloth in the warm water and squeezed it over Jane's back. "Life," she whispered.

"But what kind of—"

"You know what I've learned, Jane?" Maura said, trying to keep her voice neutral. "People want life for all sorts of different reasons, and they'll do anything to hold on to it. So if they want it," she leaned forward, kissed the space between Jane's shoulderblades, "don't ask them why, and don't stand in their way. Unless, of course," she said, "they think _you're_ in _their_ way, then the rules are a little different."

Jane reached behind her and touched Maura's head lightly as she laid her cheek against Jane's back. "You're such a smartypants," Jane whispered.

"That's _Doctor_ Smartypants to you," Maura whispered back. "Now, let's get this other dressing off."

* * *

Once Jane was as clean as she figured she could get, and had spent several minutes grumbling about having to wipe the impressive amount of dirt out of the tub for Frost—"because we gotta haul all this damn water, Jane, and I'll be fucked if I'm taking a bath in your nasty blood," he'd said helpfully—she put on the cleanest set of clothes Maura had been able to find in their extremely limited collection and went back into the kitchen, where Maura and Frost were sitting at the table, watching as the water heated on the wood stove.

"It's so warm in here," she said, smiling.

"Do you want some tea?"

"_Tea_?"

"The . . . Samuelsons were tea drinkers," Frost said, flipping an old piece of mail at her.

"Esther and John Samuelson. Sound like real fun folks," Jane said, settling into a seat at the table. "Yeah, I guess I'll take some tea. It's not made from elephant poop or tiger whiskers or . . . like . . . dolphins, is it?"

"That was _one time_," Maura hissed, tugging playfully at a lock of Jane's hair as she crossed behind her to put more snow in the kettle.

"How's Donna?" Jane asked. Frost shrugged. "I took the tape off her mouth but she hasn't said anything. Un-taped her arms, too, but kept her wrists together. She's still locked in the closet, but Dr. Isles gave her some pillows and blankets. And a cup of tea."

"Always the charming hostess," Jane sighed, couldn't help smiling as she watched Maura fuss with the teapot.

"Oh, darn," Maura whispered as snow collected on the floor at her feet.

_Maybe the apocalypse isn't so bad after all_.

"That water ready yet? Because two things, Frost, a hot bath is _amazing_. And second, you smell _terrible_."

He smirked at her. "You can probably only tell 'cause you just now got your own stank off," he said.

"I wasn't—okay, yes, I was," she admitted. "Anyway, it's great. And I think Mr. Samuelson might have left a razor or two in the medicine chest."

Frost grinned. "Look out, ladies," he said.

"How's the tea coming, Maura?"

Maura didn't respond.

"Maura?"

"Jane," she whispered, looking out the kitchen window, not moving.

"What? What is it?"

"Jane," she whispered again.

Jane pushed herself away from the table and crossed to Maura. "What?" She glanced out the window and saw a bright, intermittent light flickering across the the trees. "What—"

"I think it's a helicopter, Jane," Maura breathed, her face pale.

"Frost—"

"I'm on it," he said, leaping up and grabbing for his revolver. Maura hastily blew out the candles they'd found, then, without a word to Jane, made a beeline for Donna's closet.

"How did they find us?" she demanded. Jane and Frost glanced quizzically at each other. "Tell me," Maura said, her voice low and dangerous. "Agent Ellison, please don't think that because I've given you a cup of tea I am incapable of harming you. _How did they find us?"_

Donna shook her head, rolled her eyes. "How did _you_ find _them_?" she sneered, indicating Frost and Jane.

"The tracks, of—of course," Maura said. "It hasn't snowed, they must have been able to follow the tire tracks."

"Who's _they_, Maura?" Jane asked, as calmly as she could. "And is this something I should be worried about?"

"I don't know, exactly," Maura said, "and yes, probably."

Donna laughed bitterly.

"Somebody ask her what's going on," Jane growled, not looking at her.

"Agent Ellison?" Maura said, her voice a warning.

"You should be worried," Donna said. "I told you you were dead."

"You said _we _were dead," Maura replied, frowning. "What makes you think they won't kill you too?"

"I'm a woman," Donna said simply. "I'm young, and I'm strong, and I have skills my employers find valuable."

"Yeah, but you also fucked this up pretty bad," Frost interjected. "From where I'm standing, anyway." He glanced out a window, watched the searchlight from the helicopter dance closer to the house.

"They know I'm loyal." Donna shrugged. "And they know you're not. They'll kill you, and maybe after I repay them for my life, they'll smuggle me out of here. To Oslo, maybe. Dakar. Sydney. There are still places left, Detective Frost, for people who are willing to do what it takes to get there."

"What are we going to do, Jane?" Maura asked, ignoring Donna.

"Fight, I guess," Jane said, grabbing her own gun from where she'd set it on the table. "Come on, Frost, let's go."

"But Jane—"

"You come too, Maura, maybe you can shoot the pilot out of the sky. I'll give you twenty bucks if you do. Your rifle's in the back of the truck, I saw it. Awfully nice of Donna to bring it along for you."

Donna glared at Jane.

"Tape her mouth back up," Jane said. "Lock her in." Frost grabbed the duct tape.

"My pleasure," he said, winding a strip around Donna's head. He slammed the closet door and jammed a chair under the knob. He looked at them, nodded.

Jane and Maura exchanged a long look. "I love you," Jane whispered. Maura nodded, her mouth tight.

They burst out of the house into the snowy yard, guns pointed at the sky, waiting for the helicopter to come over the horizon. The heavy chop of its rotors was making the tops of the trees nearest them sway wildly.

"Take cover!" Jane shouted. "Aim for the pilot!"

They split up, Maura heading for the low fence at the edge of the road, Frost and Jane taking separate sides of the house. The helicopter swung over the horizon, its searchlight blazing.

The world exploded in a deafening burst of gunshots.

The men in the helicopter sprayed the yard and house with bullets, indiscriminately. Jane, Frost, and Maura returned fire, the chaos escalating quickly. The helicopter swung around, giving Jane time to glance and see that the side hatch was open, allowing a gunman to fire on them.

"Maura!" she shouted. "Can you get him?" She strained to see Maura in the near-total darkness, a shadowed shape against the glittering snow. Watched Maura take careful aim. Held her breath until the helicopter swung back around, then watched the almost-imperceptible jerk of Maura's body, then the abrupt cease of the machine gun.

"Nice," Jane whispered. "Fuck, she's good."

There was a brief pause before more gunshots rang out from the helicopter. It moved lower to accommodate its lessened firepower, giving Jane a clearer shot at the pilot.

_You only have one chance, Rizzoli_, she thought. _Come on, you can do it_.

She kept her weapon trained on the cockpit, waiting for something, anything, some tiny voice telling her _now, do it now_.

_Now, do it now—_

She shot. The helicopter paused for a moment, swinging uncertainly in the air, before dropping out of the sky with a deafening crash.

Jane stared at the wreckage. "Holy shit," she whispered. "I just shot down a helicopter."

Her ears were ringing from the force of the crash; the machine had come down just a few dozen yards from her. She couldn't hear anything clearly, just a heavy whine obscuring everything, like cotton in her ears.

She didn't hear the truck as it roared up behind her. She only noticed something was wrong when she saw Maura's dim shape suddenly leap up, the thin point of her rifle swinging in Jane's direction.

Jane whirled around, staggering back when she saw that the truck had rolled to a stop less than ten feet from her. She saw the small, neat hole in the center of the windshield, mirroring the small, neat hole in the center of Donna's forehead as she lay slumped over the steering wheel.

Jane couldn't move for a moment, paralyzed by shock. Finally she blinked, then swung around and bolted for Maura.

"Maura!" she shouted, though she could barely hear her own voice. "Maura!"

She reached Maura just in time to see her fall to her knees, holding herself upright with her rifle.

"Maura!" she shouted again. Maura's lips were moving. Her face was as white as the snow. "Maura, I can't hear you," she gasped as she skidded to a halt in front of her.

Maura's eyes were wide, but unfocused, hazy, preternaturally bright.

"Maura?"

Jane glanced down to Maura's side, saw a bright scarlet trail in the snow, saw a glittering stream of blood, sparkling like rubies, trickling down Maura's ice-white fingers.

"Oh God," Jane whispered. "Oh God, Maura."

She looked all over Maura's body, unable to see where she was hurt in the dark, before finally noticing a small glistening patch on her left shoulder.

"Oh God," she whispered, reaching forward just in time to catch Maura as she slid to the ground.

* * *

A/N: This is part 1 of the epic conclusion! Thank you so much for coming along on this crazy ride with me. It's been SO AWESOME and I'm delighted that you're into it! I know I keep saying that, but it _keeps being true_.


	18. Elysium

"Maura," Jane whispered, cradling her, trying not to aggravate the bullet wound. "Maura, honey, oh God, I'm gonna—Maura, I'm gonna take you back to the house, okay? I can't hear anything right now because of the explosion but you're gonna be okay, Maura, please, please be okay, I'm gonna take care of you—"

Maura didn't respond. Jane swept Maura's body into her arms, struggling slightly in the deep snow, and carried her back to the house as quickly as she could. Blood oozed from the bullet hole in her shoulder, dripped from her fingertips. The dull whine in Jane's ears receded slightly, she began to hear the crunch of snow under her feet, her own ragged breath echoing in her brain, her wild heartbeat thudding through her skull.

"Maura," she whispered again as she kicked open the front door. "Babe, you're gonna be all right. You just need to wake up, okay? Wake up, Maura, I need you."

She could barely breathe, the air leaking into her lungs in fitful swallows, the heavy rush of blood and breath and the ringing from the crash nearly overwhelming her.

"Frost!" she shouted. "Frost! I need you! Maura's been shot!"

Nothing.

She set Maura gently down on the table, Maura's eyes still closed, her skin white as marble. Blood dripped steadily from her fingers, pooling on the floor.

"Frost!" she shouted again.

Nothing.

She looked wildly around her, the house pitch-black save for the embers glowing dully in the woodstove. "Light," she whispered. "Water."

She snatched a candle off the table, trying to focus long enough to light it off the embers. After a few false starts the candle wavered into life; Jane carried it carefully back to the table and relit the others they'd managed to find, creating a soft glow that made Maura seem as though she were only asleep.

"Okay, Maura, I could really use your help here," she said, hefting one of the buckets of warm water off the stove. She winced reflexively but felt no pain as the action aggravated her own injuries. She carefully unzipped Maura's jacket, trying to suppress a cry of pain when she saw the wound, bright with fresh blood. "Okay," she breathed again. "Maura, I'm just gonna talk us through this and if you have any ideas you let me know, okay?"

Maura murmured something. Jane felt her heart stop for a moment; she leaned in close. "What?"

Maura murmured again, wordlessly.

"At least you're here with me," Jane whispered. "You just stay here, okay? I can't lose you, Maura, not now, I'm not going to, okay? We'll make it, I promise."

She peeled back Maura's shirt, trying to keep tears from obscuring her vision. "All right," she whispered. "It looks like a through-and-through, that's good news. There's an exit wound—" she carefully rolled Maura onto her side—"just to the right of your shoulder blade, I don't think there are any bone fragments, it looks pretty clean. The angle looks lucky—well, as lucky as it can be," she laughed harshly, "so you're gonna be okay. You hear that, Maura? Now you get to have your very own badass scar, yeah?"

Maura grimaced and moaned as Jane laid her carefully back down on the table. "I know it hurts, sweetheart," she said softly. "I know, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, Maura. Frost!" she shouted again. "Where the hell are you?"

She didn't think it was possible to feel more fear, more anxiety than she did at that moment, but when Frost failed to respond for the third time a fresh wave of terror washed over her. "Frost?" she called again, her panic rising. She glanced at Maura, pale as chalk, the deep red blood lining the bullet hole standing out in violent relief against her skin. _It's not bleeding so bad_, she thought. _She'll be okay. We'll be okay_.

Jane glanced toward the door, praying Frost would come bursting through it.

Nothing_._

"Okay, babe, this is going to hurt a lot, I'm so sorry, Maura, I'm so sorry."

She dipped a kitchen towel in the bucket of water and pressed it to the wound. Maura cried out, jerking forward, her eyes flying open.

"Maura?"

"Jane, what—"

"You got shot, honey, by someone in the helicopter. It's a through-and-through, though, smaller caliber—probably a handgun—and I don't feel any fragments, can you tell me what I need to do? Please, Maura," she breathed, "please tell me what to do."

Maura grimaced, gasping in pain. "Irrigate," she managed to say. "You need to be able to—to see the extent of the damage. Soak the towel and press it hard on the area, you need to apply pressure to stop the bleeding."

"Okay," Jane whispered, trying to keep the anguish out of her voice for Maura's sake. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay," Maura stammered. "I know. Just get it as clean as you can so you know how bad it is."

"Okay."

Jane submerged the towel in the water bucket, pressing it hard against Maura's shoulder, trying not to cry when Maura gasped. Bloody water dripped onto the floor.

_Don't look at it, Jane. _

"Okay," Maura breathed through gritted teeth. "How does it look?"

"It's the most awful thing I've ever seen," Jane said before she could stop herself. "But I mean, I've seen worse," she smiled weakly.

Maura lifted the corner of her mouth in faint amusement. "Should I be offended?" she whispered.

"Probably," Jane whispered back. "What next?"

"You'll need to confirm that there's no bone or bullet fragments lodged in the wound; foreign objects will accelerate sepsis."

"I don't want to know what that is, do I?"

Maura looked as though she were about to speak, then shook her head. "Probably not."

"How do I check for fragments?"

"You'll have to use your fingers," Maura said. Jane grimaced.

"Will it hurt?"

"It will."

"I'm so sorry, Maura, I don't want—"

"Jane, you sliced open my leg with a cell phone. You can do this."

"Yeah, I guess so," she said. "Okay, hold on."

Jane tried to block out the sound of Maura's agony as she probed the wound as gently as she could. "I think it's okay," she said, quickly dipping her fingers in the bucket, horrified by the sight of Maura's blood on her fingers.

"Good," Maura gasped. "All right, you'll need to sterilize the wound. Douse it in alcohol."

"The Samuelsons don't seem like big drinkers," Jane said.

"Medicine chest."

"Okay," Jane said, squeezing Maura's hand, "I'll be right back, I promise. I love you, Maura."

"I love you, Jane," Maura gasped, "but at this moment I'd love not bleeding on a kitchen table a little bit more."

"Should I be offended?" Jane smiled as she released Maura's hand and headed for the bathroom.

"Probably," Maura called weakly.

Jane scoured the bathroom for anything useful and finally turned up some cotton balls and a small bottle of rubbing alcohol under the sink. She ran back into the kitchen, setting her supplies down on the table.

"Remember when you said it would hurt?" Maura said, biting her lip.

"Yeah?"

"Say it again, and mean it this time."

Jane frowned, dousing cotton balls in alcohol. "It's—it's going to hurt, Maura. A lot. Are you ready?"

"As I'll ever be."

Jane squeezed her eyes shut at Maura's cry of pain as she pressed the alcohol-soaked cotton to the wound.

"I'm okay, Jane," Maura breathed. "Keep going, you have to sterilize it."

Jane clenched her jaw and continued to press fresh cotton balls to Maura's skin, cringing every time Maura writhed in pain. "I know it hurts, but you have to keep still," she said, hating the way the words sounded as they came out of her mouth. "I'm almost done. I think."

"You still have to do the exit wound," Maura said.

"Great," Jane muttered.

"Where's Detective Frost?" Maura asked, working on keeping her breathing even, her body still.

"I don't know," Jane said, furrowing her brow. "I've been yelling for him."

"Jane," Maura whispered suddenly, clutching at her arm, "I shot Donna."

"I know you did. You saved my life."

"But I—I killed her," Maura said, her eyes huge, brimming with a thousand kinds of pain.

"You saved me _and _you _and_ Frost," Jane said firmly. "That's three for one."

Maura didn't respond, only hissed through her teeth when Jane lifted her shoulder and pressed a clean cotton ball against her back.

"You can't think about it, Maura. At least not right now, okay?"

"Okay," Maura gasped. "Okay. Pressure," she mumbled, her eyelids fluttering. "Apply pressure, pack the wound, cover it as tightly as you can."

"Maura?" Jane said as Maura's voice got softer and more indistinct. "Maura, stay with me, okay?"

"It's fine, Jane," she mumbled. "I'm fine, just—shock—but my clothes and the snow, they helped slow the bleeding, just make me . . . make me stay awake . . ."

"Maura, stay awake," Jane said. "Maura!" she cried. "Maura, don't close your eyes, just listen to me. Maura," Jane pleaded. "Maura, please."

"I'm here," she whispered, though her voice was far away.

"Maura!" she shouted. Maura blinked slowly, hazily, but kept her eyes open.

Jane heard a scuffle at the front door and glanced away, then back at Maura, unsure of where to look.

"Jane," Frost gasped, stumbling into the kitchen. "What's going on?"

"Holy shit, Frost, I thought you were dead," she said. "Go get me some towels and see if there's any more cotton balls or gauze or anything in the bathroom, okay?"

"Nice to see you too," he mumbled, clutching his head.

It was only after he'd left the room that Jane realized he was bleeding.

"Fuck," she whispered.

"What is it?" Maura murmured. "Something bad?"

"No," Jane said softly, holding her hand and using her other hand to press down on the wound. "No, it's fine. Frost's here."

"Oh good," Maura whispered.

"Yeah, it's great," Jane smiled, looking into Maura's unfocused eyes. "Babe," she breathed, "I need you to come back, come be with me, okay?"

"All I want is to be with you," Maura breathed. "That's all I ever wanted, I think."

Jane's heart leaped into her throat. "I know the feeling," she whispered.

"Next time let's not wait for the zombies, okay?"

"Okay," Jane grinned. "Deal."

Frost made his way back into the room, a package of cotton pads in one hand and the roll of duct tape they'd used to secure Donna in the other. "It's all I could find," he said.

"It's perfect. And what's wrong, what happened? Are you okay?"

"Donna tried to get the drop on me," he said. "Pistol-whipped me with my own damn gun. Would've shot me," he shrugged, "but I never trusted that bitch, so I kept my eye on the door and dropped the clip as soon as I saw her coming."

"Why didn't you shoot her?"

"What, you're criticizing my technique now?"

"No, I'm—"

"There was a lot going on, Jane," he said. "I didn't plan for any of it to happen the way it did. But it's how it happened."

"Yeah," she said, smiling wanly at him. "Thanks."

"For getting knocked in the head with my own weapon? I guess. What can I do to help?"

"Hello, Detective Frost," Maura mumbled drowsily.

"Hello, Doctor Isles," Frost replied, smiling at her. "You don't look so hot."

"Neither do you," Maura said.

"Frost, will you help me pack this with cotton balls? And is there another towel or something we can use to cover it all up? I promise we'll take care of you next, because that's gotta hurt like hell."

"I didn't even get a _bath_, Jane," he said. "Then I got the CIA all up in my business, and now the only nice one here gets shot. It's been a hell of a night."

"Hey, I'm nice!" Jane cried as she pressed an alcohol-soaked cotton ball to Maura's shoulder, causing her to cry out. "I know it doesn't sound that way right now, but she told me to do it."

"Jane never listens to me," Maura said. "Not ever."

"I do too! It's not my fault if you're always telling me I have to do gross stuff."

"Ohh," Maura breathed, her voice sad. "You think I'm gross?"

"Nice going, Jane," Frost smiled, wincing at the pain in his head. "She gets shot for you and you think she's gross."

"I do _not_ think she's gross! I don't think you're gross, I think you're beautiful."

"Did you hear, Detective Frost? Jane thinks I'm beautiful," Maura smiled dreamily.

"She's not always wrong," Frost smiled again, glancing at Jane. "Just most of the time."

"Okay," Jane said, ignoring him. "I'm gonna take the towel off and try to get it clean before we tape it up. Are you ready?"

Maura nodded. Jane looked at Frost.

"Yeah, let's do it."

Jane pulled the cloth back, biting her lip as a small trickle of blood ran from the hole in Maura's shoulder. "It's not bleeding too much," she managed. "You're gonna be okay."

"Hooray," Maura said.

Jane and Frost worked quickly to stuff cotton in the wound, covering it with alcohol-soaked pads, both of them grimacing when Maura cried out.

"That really hurts, you guys," she mumbled.

"Sorry," they replied in unison.

"Almost done," Jane whispered. "Frost, the towel?"

He handed it to her and she wound it around Maura's shoulder, under her arm, laying the edge flat. "Tape." Frost ripped a strip of duct tape from the roll and helped Jane smooth it over the edge of the cloth binding Maura's wound.

"Good as new," Jane breathed, leaning down to place a kiss on Maura's forehead.

"Hooray," Maura said again. "Can I go to sleep now?"

"Not yet, I'm sorry. I know it's been a long day, but you have to stay awake a little bit longer."

"Because I'm in shock," Maura said.

"Yes," Jane replied, "because you're in shock."

"The symptoms should subside now that the wound has been treated and dressed," Maura mumbled. "But I'll need antibiotics soon."

"I'll find them, don't worry," Jane whispered. "I'm going to take such good care of you, Maura, even _you'll_ be impressed."

"Everything you do is impressive," Maura said softly.

"Oh, Maura, that's not—"

"Just let her think you're a hero for a little while," Frost cut in gently. "She'll come to her senses soon enough."

"Fuck you," Jane muttered, grinning. "Okay, babe, let's get you off this table. Frost, you wanna give me a hand? Let's put her on the couch in the living room."

Together they carefully lifted Maura off the table and carried her into the adjoining room, setting her gently on the couch. Jane stuffed throw pillows under Maura's shoulder to keep her wound elevated, kissed her softly, and turned to Frost.

"Okay, what's your problem?"

He shook his head. "Aside from having a motherfucker of a headache I think I'm all right. Superficial cut on the forehead, it's pretty bloody but I don't think it's that bad. I would've been in for a lot worse if she didn't still have her hands taped together; she wasn't that big but damn she was strong."

"How'd she get out of the house, anyway?"

Frost shrugged. He pointed at the splintered closet door. "Strong," he said again. "These old houses, they're pretty sturdy, but they're also . . ."

"Old?"

"Yeah."

"Well," Jane said after a brief moment. "I guess it's my turn to heat up the water."

"What are you talking about?"

"You didn't even get a _bath_, Frost," Jane teased. "And you _still_ stink."

"But the helicopter, Jane, they'll be coming back-"

"I got a feeling they'll _always_ be coming back for us," Jane sighed. "But if they come right now, there's not a whole hell of a lot we can do about it. We can't move Maura for a while, especially not on motorcycles. And as someone who just took a hot bath for the first time in six weeks, let me tell you, if you're gonna die, you're at least gonna want to die clean."

Frost grinned. "I'll even help you, Jane."

"Throw some more wood on the fire," she said, "I'll start filling up the buckets."

They worked quietly for a while. Jane stopped to check on Maura every few minutes; she wasn't at her most alert but she was awake, and able to talk coherently.

"How you feeling, babe?" Jane whispered, cupping Maura's face and running her thumb across her cheek.

"Like I got shot from a helicopter," Maura muttered.

"Yeah, well, the distance probably saved your life. And the small-caliber weapon. Nice shooting there, Tex. If you hadn't taken out the machine gunner we'd all be dead."

"Yeah," Maura smiled faintly. "That _was_ pretty cool, wasn't it?"

"It was _way_ cool," Jane grinned.

"But not as cool as taking down a whole helicopter."

"That," Jane said, kissing Maura again, "was _incredibly_ cool."

"We have to keep running, don't we?" Maura asked, her voice shaded with sorrow.

"Yes," Jane whispered. "I'm so sorry, sweetheart, but we do. At least for a little while, until we find somewhere safer."

"As long as you're with me, Jane," Maura said, the weariness in her voice finally sounding more like pure exhaustion than the dull blankness of shock, "I'll go anywhere. As long as you're with me."

"I'll always be with you, Maura," Jane said, at last allowing the tears to spill down her cheeks. "I swear."

"Don't cry, Jane," Maura said, lifting her hand to brush away the tears. "I hate it when you cry."

"I won't, then," Jane smiled, catching Maura's hand and pressing her fingers to her lips. "As long as you're with me."

"I swear," Maura murmured.

"Jane," Frost called, "This water's finally hot, can I trouble you to carry a bucket in here? Then I promise I'll leave you two to your . . . uh . . ."

"Yeah," she called. "I'll be right back," she said, kissing Maura again.

"I'll be right here," Maura said, "I promise."

* * *

A/N: Thank you guys SO SO MUCH for your support of this story! Of course there's _so much more_ going on, and so of course I'll have to write a sequel. _Of course_. I am, like, unbelievably grateful and overwhelmed and delighted by how willing you've been to go along with me on this, and I'm so excited to start working on the next part! YOU ARE THE BEST.


End file.
